Flux's Story
by Loblolly
Summary: So hey.. the whole thing, unfinished, and never to be finished. Sorry. Got otherwise occupied writing other things.


Story skips from perspective to perspective-catch it if you can! Everything from me is in first person until I 'awake', then I join the third person on the Nebuchandnezzar. And- Mouse didn't die- he was just really really badly hurt and stayed in the 'health room'(infirmary? where Dozer got his heart started again) through the end of the movie... He told me later, himself. So, believe what you want! Oh, and Neo says that if you saw what he went through when they pulled him out, a lot of the stuff that happened to me is similar in some way... and just as weird!  
-Flux  
  
It was that Wednesday. The worst Wednesday of my life, the scariest Wednesday of my life until it happened. Then it was the best Wednesday of my entire life, the god damned best DAY of my entire life. I was walking home from school, the mile trek- I lived just far enough away from the school that I was on the edge of the 'bussable' and 'non bussable' people- the closest bus stopped a quarter mile away. So anyways, I was walking home, through the shortcut my buddy Highlighter had shown me, thinking about what the heck my next move was going to be. They had called me into the school office today to ask me 'a few questions' about a hack into the Federal Budget database. Somehow, they had traced it back to the school district, but not to the exact person. So they just brought everyone they suspected into the office, one by one, and interrogated them. Literally. They did everything but rip your toenails out. Luckily, I'm not the type who cracks under pressure- I just get sarcastic. I don't know if that's better or not. I'm pretty used to the office- I get called in there at least once a month for some bogus thing that I did, but this took the cake. I had no clue how much of it they had put together - the hack into the Fed D-base was made under the name Flux- and all the garbage I've done with the school grades and such was with the name Gremlin- My mind was just going as fast as the little hamster wheels could turn. Had I left anything anywhere linking the names Flux and Gremlin? If I had, my ass and my goose were so cooked I might have well been a flambe. Those are the two names I go by- Flux for big deals, like this and the DMV d-base and the IRS D-base, and Gremlin for little things that are local- like when I changed half the grades in the school computer system. Wait...I knew how they had traced it to the district- I had gone through the district server to try to make it less obvious where it was coming from. And I bet I know how they chose the people they took in to question- we were all the people that wear black on a regular basis. Black with long coats. Now, I may wear black, but I'm not a goth. I'm pure hacker, and besides, my trademark is to be wearing a little bit of purple and silver somewhere. The last person who called me goth had to go in for testicle retrieval surgery. He had it coming anyway. There's a difference between goth and hacker- goths throw on the first piece of dark black crap they step on after getting out of bed, and usually it's baggy. Goth girls are the ripped fishnets-dominatrix types-the sluts. They'll sleep with any goth guy that looks at them twice. Hackers actually care what they look like- usually our clothes are spandexy or futuristic, and us hacker chix refuse to expose skin just to get attention. Back to the point, the point twice removed, I'm a good little hacker, if not a little panicked, and was dressed like one, (my trademark black velvet Converse All-Stars and all) but the guy that was hanging around halfway through the shortcut could have sucked the colors right off of someone's tie-dye shirt, he was so black. He was just the total perfect hacker. You could just smell it, like it was oozing right through his pores. Black hair, rimless black sunglasses, long black leather coat, huge boots that had buckles all down them. God, he looked awesome. If I had won a million bucks spontaneously, that's what I'd have spent it on. If you could have bottled that look... man, you could have suckered me into anything. I was instantly kind of wary, I mean what was this guy doing hanging around in this out of the way shortcut in a residential area? He wasn't smoking, on a cigarette break from the techno-world, and besides, the hackers I know who smoke do it inside. Hackers are kind of like vampires. They'd rather be plugged into a computer, be inside than outside. It's almost like sun hurts them. Of course, some of us just feel more connected to the cyber-world than the real one. I have a whole herd of people I count as 'friends' or 'allies' online. At school, I can count the number of people like that on one hand. If there were such a thing as an internet I.V. I'd be the first in line for one. The guy was still there, just standing. I kept walking. He was watching me from behind those awesome sunglasses. I'm one of those people that can feel it when someone's watching them. I ignored it, until he spoke.   
"Flux."  
I whirled around.   
"That's your name, isn't it?" he asked.   
"I don't know, is it?" I replied, rather snidely. I was freaked. Was he going to report me to the school, to the cops, to the FBI? Was this the last time I was ever going to see the light of day? My heart was in my mouth. I could just hope...hackerkind don't usually rat on their own.... and he was definitely one of us... I could just hope.   
"It was your name last night. But don't doubt the Secret Service."  
My brain kicked into overdrive- In the chat room last night- the messages I was getting... that was one of them... but where was it .... in the newspaper..... they gave credit to someone else for using..... the same line...  
"You... the paper.... last month..... the Secret Service... that...that-line...."  
He was nodding. I was on the right track.  
"The.... Jesus. You're NEO."  
Neo grinned.   
"And you're Flux."  
"Yeah... I feel like I should be bowing or something."   
He chuckled.   
"Don't bother."  
Neo reached into the pocket of his coat, suddenly serious. The mood around darkened, and everything seemed to hush.  
"For three years, you've been on the verge. You've felt it. The feeling that something's not quite right and the answer is just out of your grasp. The question." he said. "What you've been asking anyone who might give you the slightest clue. It's the question that keeps us going."  
"What is the Matrix?" I whispered. He nodded again.   
"Are you still curious?"   
I nodded, just barely at first, then harder.   
"Good. Take this. Things will make more sense later." He pressed something cold and plastic into my palm, face down. I looked down and turned it over. I brushed a button on the side and part of it popped open. It was a brand spanking new model Nokia cell phone. I looked up again, a question on my lips, but he was gone. I turned around. Nothing. Nobody. With almost perfect timing, the Oregon skies opened up and the rain fell. A few drops landed on the phone. Looking at it one more time, I closed the faceplate, dropped it in the pocket of my coat, and ran for home.   
  
%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%**  
Neo opened his eyes as Trinity pulled the connector out of the socket at the back of his head. He grimaced, and sat up. Water pooled in the seat of the chair.   
"Didn't believe me when I said Oregon was the rainiest state in the U.S, did you?" Tank asked from his control seat. Neo shook his head, sending a spray of droplets in all directions. Trinity took a step back, as so not to get her own little rainstorm and handed a towel pointedly to Neo, who grinned and good naturedly rubbed at his wet hair.   
"Did you make contact with her?" Trinity asked.   
"Flux? Yeah. I gave her the connection."  
"Will she be...?" Trinity asked, leaving her question unsaid.  
Neo nodded, the towel over his face.  
"That's the only thing I'm worried about. Will she make the right choices? Will she have enough experience? Will she panic at the wrong moments? She'll be the youngest anyone's ever freed..." She let the words hang, running a hand through her hair and tucking it behind her ears. Tank jumped down from his chair and walked over to join them.   
"I think she'll be fine. She's the best I've seen, even despite her age. Wizard programmer, awesome graphics. She has a few more tricks to learn, but not many," Neo was saying. Tank nodded.   
"She's the best. She's the best anyone's ever found."  
"I'm still worried about the age issue." Trinity was saying.   
Mouse wandered in, still moving slowly after his near-death not more that a month ago.   
"Has anyone see the connector cable I was working on yesterday?" he asked, shoving his hat back up off his forehead. Neo looked over his shoulder and pointed down at the floor.   
"Isn't that it back there?"   
Mouse hunkered down to look.   
"How old was Mouse?" Trinity whispered to Tank.  
"I don't know. I don't think he could have been over sixteen though."  
"Then she should be fine, shouldn't she. If she's fourteen, almost fifteen... she should be okay..."  
"Who?" Mouse asked, standing up behind Trinity with the cable.   
"The girl we've found. She's getting too close to the truth and the Agents have her on round-the-clock surveillance. She's a brilliant data manipulator and graphics wizard." Trinity told him. Tank wandered back over and sat down in front of his monitors again.  
"Did you think to check the school records? See if she's been in trouble or what," Mouse suggested, looking at both ends of the cable.   
Trinity looked over at Tank.   
"I'm on it, I'm on it." he said, as he tapped furiously at the keyboard. Neo got up and stood behind him. Trinity wiped the puddles of water off the chair and joined them. Tank ran a finger down the screen.  
"That her?"  
Neo nodded. "Yeah."  
Tank tapped a few keys more.   
"School records for Beaverton High School, student, Teka Langden."  
"Teka Langden?" Mouse asked, looking up from the wires he was unwinding. "That's a weird one."   
"It's not any worse than some of the ones I've heard. What's it say?" Neo peered closer at the screen.  
"Suspended for a month for making a threatening comment, that she admits to- 'Someday all the 'computer geeks' you're talking about will be running your life. Then who'll be laughing?'" Neo and Trinity grinned at the unintentional irony of the comment.   
"That's a load of crap." Mouse said indignantly. "I knew people who did worse things and didn't even get detention."  
"That's not all she did. 'Fighting in cafeteria. Says boy in question started it by threatening her for money. Minor injuries on her part, major injuries on his.' Refusal to leave black coat at home. Dressing in threatening manner. Cannibalizing other's CD players for parts. Using school computers to access restricted areas.' Oh, here... 'Suspended for a week under suspicion for changing grades in school database. Never found guilty.' Here's the kicker: grades. English\Science Fiction: A. German: A. European Studies: -A Math: B. Orchestra:A Theater:A Science: B' Tank announced.  
"We should get her." Trinity said, looking over Tank's head to Neo. "Before someone else does. I wouldn't trust that school."  
Neo nodded, meeting her eyes. "Tonight."   
"Dammit!" Tank swore. Three heads snapped in his direction. He hit one key, then again and again. "Dammit!"  
"What?" Neo asked, looking over his shoulder.   
"There, look." Tank pointed to a scrolling column of green characters.  
"Shit. They've got her..." Trinity said. "We have to get her out as soon as possible."  
"I'll go tell Morpheus!" Mouse called.   
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
  
I ran half of the way left to get back home, then slowed to a walk. It wasn't like I was getting any drier as I ran. If my mental hamsters had been running their asses off before, now they were trying out for a Richard Simmons workout video. I had just met Neo. NEO. King, or at least Prince, of Hackers. He was like a god... him and the one named Trinity- who I still, contrary to popular belief, thought was female, and Morpheus, the first one.... they were all the hacker deities. I was in shellshock. Those were the three names I still associated with the search I had been on for the past three years- the search for the Matrix. The truth about the Matrix, not the BS that's all over the net. And here was Neo, God, offering it to me on a silver platter. It was just too good. I was wondering if I wasn't dreaming as I put my key in the door and let myself into the house.   
It wasn't like I noticed it immediately. It wasn't blatantly obvious once I got in that someone had broken in. The first thing that tipped me off was the fact that my monitor wasn't in sleep mode the way it usually was when I got home. That I could attribute to the dog, knocking the leg of my desk or something. But when I looked at the list of most recently accessed files, it gave me a bunch of gobbledygook about having it erased by an outside access number. Okay. I obviously didn't do that. I told it to give me the number. Nothing. I traced it as far back as I could. They were checking on something I had done a while ago... oh crap. It was Sniper. They were checking on Sniper. For crying out loud, they should have realized that Sniper was a one-shot-off program. I designed it especially to get into the principal's box, bring up his virus scanning screen, and tell him he had a virus. Then, when someone hit the enter key, it brought up this animation -one of my best ones yet-of a little person dressed in all black (which was actually me, if you looked hard enough) who flipped you off and then disappeared. The second time you hit enter, it took you right back into whatever you were doing, no harm done. I loved Sniper. I used it on all of the principals at least four times-all you had to do was change the virus name and it was new panic. I loved it. And they could never trace it back to me. At least not until now... and if they had traced it back to me, my ass was grass.... But they didn't have a warrant to come in- they always stick it on the door, at least on T.V, so I would have seen it... wouldn't I have? . Okay, I was pissed. That violated a whole buttload of my constitutional rights. A big buttload. I found the phone, and dialed 911.   
"911, operator."  
"Yeah, my house at 6514 Ladnhy Ave has been broken into."  
"Let me send a dispatch over there right now. Don't touch anything you think may have been tampered with. The police should be there in about ten minutes. Goodbye."  
"Yeah, thanks... A whole freaking lot." I muttered as I hung up. I love how people totally snub teenagers and treat us like dirt. Oh well. It was going to be a while before anyone showed up here-all the cops were probably out on donut break. When someone threw a cherry bomb in our mailbox on the last Fourth of July, it took them oh, what... an hour and a half to respond? And I seriously doubted they'd be any faster today. I decided I'd get a snack- I live on Fritos - and then go work on the, uh 'replacement' logo I was making to paste on the school webpage just for a cheap thrill- that's my second love after programming- graphics. Screw calling either of my parents- they'd just panic and want to come home from California where they were both on business, and I'd get no work done here.   
  
I had my head halfway inside the refrigerator when the doorbell rang. I pulled my elbow out of my mother's lemon yogurt, where it had landed while I was pawing for the leftover chocolate pudding, whacked my head on the inside of the fridge, and stood up. Whoever was outside was leaning on the stupid bell like there was no tomorrow.   
"Shut the hell up." I told the doorbell as I wiped the lemon yogurt off of my coat sleeve. "I'm coming." I peeked out the side window and just about froze solid. There were four cop cars in the driveway and one evil-looking black Ford number.   
"Holy shit." was all I could come up with. There were at least eight cops milling around, another four clustered around the door, and four guys standing a little apart that were in the ugliest suits I think I've ever seen looking like Rogaine poster boys from the Secret Service, curly-wire earphone and all. I dropped the window blinds and stood there for a moment, just thinking. There was a noise at the door. A megaphone? I looked around the corner. Of course not. They were just trying to beat the door in. Hoping to throw them off, I opened the door. The cop who had been banging his little heart out did an abrupt stop, turn-around and whipped his gun out into my face. I arched an eyebrow. To my surprise, and probably his too, I was totally unafraid about having a gun barrel shoved up my nose.   
"Hello?" I asked. The cop did another double take then glanced over his shoulder. Two of the Secret Service guys were walking through the mob of cops who were splitting in front of them like the Red Sea.   
"Miss Langden?" the taller man asked me.   
"Maybe." I was trying for time, time to figure out how to play this.   
"Miss Langden, I'm going to have to ask you to come with us." the second Secret Service wannabe said.   
"I don't think so." I leaned against the doorframe, using my foot to hold the screen door open just slightly. The taller guy turned around and made a gesture towards the other two. The cops looked around nervously as they came forward. One of the first two opened the door wide, and the other two grabbed me by the arms.   
"Hey!" I yelled. "Get off me!" No effect. I was being dragged bodily down the driveway towards the black car. I had had totally enough of this crap today. I dug my heels in and refused to move. The head secret service guy, the tall one, behind me, prodded me in the back.  
"Move."  
"No."  
"You. Will. Move."  
"No. I. Won't." I bit out. Before he could do anything further, I kicked out behind me, as hard as I could. I didn't wait to see where I'd hit him. I heard him whoof and go down, and I went into motion. Swinging my arms, somehow I managed to get free. The only thing in my head was to run. As fast as I could.   
  
I took off as hell-bent fast as I could, down the driveway, across the street, and into the park. I thought that maybe it would take them long enough to get sorted out that I could be through to the opposite end of the park and over Highlighter's fence before they could follow. No such luck. The whole thing perfectly proved Flux's Law- Anything, Everything, and All things that can go Wrong or Blow Up in Your Face, Will, And if it makes you look Stupid or Otherwise Dumb, that's a Plus. I had only made it halfway through the park before a bullet whizzed past my ear. I ducked, but kept going. I reached the fence, and started to climb over. I had everything but my left leg over when the head secret service guy caught up with me. He grabbed my leg and yanked. I guess I must have hit the pavement pretty hard, because the next thing I remember is being in the back of the black car with two of the Secret Service guys in front. My head was pounding. Abruptly, the car stopped, and both guys got out. The lead one came around and yanked me out of the car. I hadn't noticed before, but someone had slapped a pair of handcuffs on me. The building they were taking me into was almost spooky. The outside was all silvery with mirrored windows, and the inside was black, shiny and smooth on every surface. The two guys that had brought me in handed me off to one guy that looked almost the same as the first two and a woman that looked like she hadn't smiled in at least a decade.   
They marched me up to the elevators- that ran so smoothly it was like they weren't moving at all- and into a small white room with nothing but a table and two chairs in it. The woman and the look-alike guy sat me in the chair facing the door, took off the handcuffs and left, leaving me alone in the room. It looked almost like that room in Mission:Impossible, you know, the one Tom Cruise breaks into, except for the fact that it was a lot smaller and the floor didn't look as cool. I looked around, trying to figure out what was going to happen to me. I swear, everyone in the whole building should have been able to hear my heart, it was thumping so loud. I was working almost purely on adrenaline.   
The door opened, and I whirled around to face it. Three more of the Rogaine boys came in. But the one in the lead was different somehow. You could almost sense he was different-he was the one in charge. I don't know how I knew. I just did. He had a folder with something written on the front. It wasn't very full, but it had enough in it to make me wary- it looked like the permanent record folder some principal was always waving at me when I was in trouble at school. Internally, I rolled my eyes. The leader sat down across the table from me and opened the folder. He paged through it, taking his damn good time, and then looked up at me.   
"Miss Langden." he said slowly. Somehow I had the feeling that everything he said would be slow. "Do you know why you are here?"  
"If I knew, I might have come without giving myself a damn concussion." I rubbed the side of my head for emphasis.   
"You are leading a double life." He turned another sheet in the folder over.   
"Gee, tell me something I don't know."  
"As far as everyone around you knows, you are Teka Langden, 3.75 GPA student, electric violin player and 'synthesizer maven' in the band 'Falling off the Stage', computer genius, and self proclaimed 'drama geek.' Am I correct?"  
"I don't know. You know everything. You tell me." I leaned back in the chair and crossed my arms. He steepled his fingers and continued.   
"You are also the brilliant hacker Flux who managed to get into the united states federal budget database, and into the IRS database, even with the tightened security measures. Under another name, the name of Gremlin, you changed all of the grades in the Beaverton School District database. "  
"Okay, bring it home. What's your freaking point?" I stood up, turned the chair around and sat in it backwards.  
"We brought you here to offer you a sort of deal. A trade off, if you will."  
"And if I won't?" I told you I get sarcastic when I panic.   
"We happen to know that you have been contacted by the man named Neo. This Neo, do you know anything about him?"   
"What, you think I'm his illegitimate child or something?" Oh, jeezus, I wish.   
"He is connected to the man we have been trying to ruin. The man named Morpheus. Both, together, considered by some to be the most dangerous pair of men in the world. The deal I can offer you is this. You help us bring both Neo and Morpheus to justice, and we can, metaphorically speaking, wipe the slate clean and give you a fresh start on your life. I urge you to consider your choices carefully."  
"Yeah, well I urge you to bite me. Piss off, you freaks. I wouldn't help you even if I did know what this was about."   
"I find your attitude regrettable, Miss Langden."   
"Yeah, well, my attitude can change. You're stuck with that face forever."  
The lead agent guy made a gesture to the other two. Before I knew what was going on, they had yanked me out of the chair and pinned me flat on my back on top of the table. I kicked and squirmed wildly, trying to get away. One of the helpers pulled my shirt up, exposing my stomach. The lead agent stood over me. He pulled a small box out of his jacket and plucked something small and metallic out of the box.   
"This is your last chance, Miss Langden. You can help us under your own free will, or you can help us the difficult way." The thing in his hand started to quiver and grow.   
"Bite me." I spat onto his face, still struggling to get away. He ignored it. The thing in his hand had enlarged, grown in to what looked like a watery chrysalis. With a shake, it shook off the outer covering. Whiplike tendrils flailed in the air.   
"Very well, Miss Langden." He dropped the thing, whatever it was, onto my stomach. It was cold, and I gasped as it started to crawl it's way towards my navel.   
"Aahh... aahh..." I was gasping. The thing hesitated, then dug it's front end into my navel. I panicked, and just flat out screamed, struggling to get away. With one last gruesome slurp, the thing pulled itself inside my body, leaving not even the smallest evidence it was ever there. I screamed louder.  
  
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
On the Nebuchandnezzar, things were bustling. Neo, Trinity, Morpheus and Mouse were getting ready for their upcoming journey into the Matrix to retrieve Flux. Tank was keeping a close eye on Flux's run in with the agents.   
"Dammit!" he cried, suddenly.  
"What..." Trinity put a hand on his shoulder and peered at the screen.   
"She's bugged. The bastards bugged her." Tank pounded a fist on the edge of the keyboard.   
"Bugged?" Neo came over and joined the others in looking at the screens.   
"Remember the thing we pulled out of you?"  
Neo grimaced.  
Trinity nodded. "Not a pretty picture. They've put one of those in her... are you okay?" Neo had turned a greenish-gray color, and she put her hand on his elbow.   
"Yeah... I think I'm okay... just bad memories." he told her. "Thanks."  
"No problem."   
Tank punched a key, and then watched the screen for a moment.   
"She's back. The Agents don't have her anymore. It's clear to go in."   
Morpheus had come up behind them, and now he dropped a hand on Tank's shoulder.  
"We're ready?" he asked the four. Trinity, Neo, and Mouse all dispersed and started the Matrix boot-up program on the linking apparatus. Morpheus leaned in and looked at the screens surrounding Tank.   
"She's bugged." Tank informed him. "but other than that she's okay, I think."   
Morpheus nodded. "Good work. Keep us updated."  
Trinity was helping Mouse into his chair and getting him situated. She took the connector cable, and ducking under the headrest, slid it smoothly into the port on the back of the boy's head.   
"See ya in a few..." His eyes closed and he joined the Matrix.   
Neo came up behind Trinity.   
"You next?" he asked. She nodded, and climbed into her own chair. Leaning back, she felt Neo slide the connecting needle into the back of her head. Half-smiling, she repeated Mouse's words.   
"See ya in a few..."  
Neo grinned and sat down in his own chair. Tank broke away from his screens long enough to come over and hook the cable into Neo.   
"That never looks comfortable," he commented.  
Neo grinned. "You get used to it, trust me."  
Tank smiled to himself as Morpheus got himself situated in his chair. His cable went in with a click.  
  
In the abandoned hotel, a phone rang.   
  
The boy appeared first, blinking against the bright fluorescent light. The woman was next, straightening her jacket, followed by the man, running a hand through his hair, and the second man, straightening the sunglasses clipped to the bridge of his nose. The first man lifted the phone.   
"We're in."  
*Good luck* came the reply.  
Neo smiled as he set the phone back in its cradle.   
"Let's get moving."  
  
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
  
I woke up with a start. The first thing that ran through my mind was that weird dream. I pulled my shirt up and poked at my stomach. There was no obvious little wormy thing. I shook my head. I have to remember to stop drinking that pure-caffeine tea in the morning. It gives me weird dreams. The clock was staring at me- 11:30 P.M. Oh well. I always was a night person. But where did the hours go? The last thing I remember is getting home from school at 3:30. Then I noticed the weirdest thing of all. I was wearing what I was wearing to school yesterday-what I had been wearing in the dream. I held the hem of the shirt out and looked at it carefully. Something made a loud and unfamiliar noise. I jumped, then realized what it was. The cell phone- THE CELL PHONE IN MY POCKET. It couldn't have been a dream then, at least not that part. I pushed the button on the side of it and held it up to my ear.   
"Hello?"  
"This is an unsecured line, so I must be brief. Are you still asking your question?"  
"Huh?... oh, yeah!.."  
"Be at the Montgomery Park building in an hour."  
*Click*   
I held the phone away from my ear. That was definitely not Neo. This voice was at least one and a half octaves deeper- it sounded African - American, and I had no clue who it was or what to believe. With a shrug, I closed the phone up. Montgomery Park -that was all the way down town. If there was ever a time when I needed public transportation, this was it. Grabbing my all-season bus-pass, I set out on foot for the Beaverton Transit Center. I'd be lucky if I made it on time.   
  
  
I managed to make it down to Montgomery Park with five minutes to spare. It's a weird old building- I think at one time it was a hotel, way down on the south end of town. It was condemned or quarantined or whatever sometime in the past, because it's right on the verge of falling down. All of the signs were either ripped off or fell down a while ago-now it's just common sense to stay out. I stood in the rain and looked it for a minute, then sat down on the crumbling stoop under the ripped and dripping awning. It wasn't the first time I was glad to have the black coat I always wear-it's a vinyl-y pleather thing and keeps the wet out really well. There was a crack of lighting in the distance. Great. Oregon's one big annual lighting storm and I'm out in it. Whoever's running special effects in my life is having way too much fun. I sighed and pulled my hands into the sleeves of the coat. My once-curly-today hair was now slicked down to my head from the rain. I checked my watch. 12:27. If nothing happened in five minutes, I told myself, I was going to pack up and go home. Once in a while, having both parents out of town was a good thing. There was a splash in front of me, bringing my thoughts back to reality. A big black old car had pulled up in front of the crumbling building. The backseat door swung open.   
"Get in." It was a woman's hard-as-steel voice. I got up, pushing my soggy hair out of my eyes. With a shrug-what else could possibly happen, and how much worse could it get- I climbed into the car and closed the door behind me. As my eyes adjusted, I realized Neo was driving and I was in the backseat with a woman dressed similarly to the way he was-black hair, sunglasses, long coat.   
"Lean back and pull your shirt up." she said. "Neo, lights." I did as she said-why the heck not. She pulled a nasty-looking contraption of glass tubes and metallic controls up from the floor between the seats.   
"Whoa!" I said as she plunked it down over my navel.   
"We think you're bugged. Don't tense up."  
Okay, yeah. Don't tense up, even though there's this evil-looking thing on my stomach. Little metal clasps shot out from the bottom of the glass tube and stuck into my skin. I jumped.   
"Hold still." There was an electronic whir as the woman worked the controls on the thing. A bump rose under my skin, enclosed in the glass tube. It wiggled.   
"What the..." I started. The woman pushed something on the side of the machine. Electricity shot out, crisscrossing the tube and being absorbed into the bump. With a nasty sucking sound, it flew out of me, and into another glass tube in the machine.   
"Gotcha." the woman said, taking the tube where the thing was and dumping it out the window.   
"That thing... was real?" I squeaked. Neo's knuckles tightened almost imperceptibly on the steering wheel, and I got no answer. With a sigh, the car rolled to a stop.   
"Trinity, you take her up. I'll be there as soon as I can."  
The woman-Trinity, nodded and got out of the car. I climbed out on the other side.   
"Trinity?" I squeaked. "Trinity, the Trinity that hacked the IRS- The one whose footsteps I followed in?" She stopped and looked back at me, her eyes cold.   
"Yes."  
"I thought you were a chick!" I crowed in triumph. "It's a real honor to meet you."   
She gave me a nod, and a small smile, and patted me on the back. "There's not many of us girls in the business. And the IRS is no small feat."  
I followed her into the building- the sign said 'Joyce Hotel' and up a set of black and white checkered stairs to stand in front of a pair of big elaborately carved oak doors.   
"You're about to meet Morpheus. Don't be smart, don't make things up and don't lie. He knows more than anybody could guess."  
"Morpheus?" I squeaked. I seemed to be doing an awful lot of squeaking lately. "THE Morpheus?"  
Trinity nodded.  
"Don't be scared." She opened the door with one hand and held it open as she ushered me through. There was a man standing in front of the window, looking out at the rain. He turned as I came in.   
"Flux."  
I nodded.  
"It is truly an honor to meet you. I have enjoyed watching you at work.'   
"The honor is mine, sir..." I shook the offered hand.   
"Just Morpheus will do. Please, have a seat." He gestured to the two leather armchairs in the center of the room. I sat in one, tucking my legs around the carved chair legs.   
"Do you know why you've been brought here?"  
"Because I've been too close to the question? Or too close to the truth..."  
"Not too close, just close enough. Do you read science fiction?"  
I nodded. "That's all I read."  
"Have you ever read a book where the machines have taken over? Have beat their creators? Have held them captive?"  
I looked at him quizzically. "That's the first rule of robotics, I thought... a machine may not hurt its creator."  
From behind his sunglasses, Morpheus looked slightly taken aback, but he recovered quickly.  
"Good. You're a thinker, Flux. We need thinkers. We have brought you here to show you the truth. To answer the question you have been asking for the past three years."   
"What is the Matrix?" I whispered. He nodded.   
"I have the ability to show you." He opened the silver box and took out two small pills.   
"Take the red pill-" he opened his left hand. "and you will see just how deep the fantasy goes. Take the blue pill-" he opened his right hand "and you will wake up in your own bed and believe this nothing but a dream." I heard Neo come in and stand behind me. Trinity stood behind Morpheus.   
Everything was still and silent. I hesitantly reached out.  
"I urge you to choose wisely."  
I stopped for second, weighing the possibilities, the reached out, took the red pill and popped it into my mouth before I could lose the guts to do it. Morpheus' face broke out into a grin. Behind him, one side of Trinity's mouth curved up. She looked behind me at Neo. I could only guess that he was smiling too.   
"Welcome, Flux. Neo, go tell Mouse to get the trace program running. Flux, the pill you took is part of a trace program. It's designed to disrupt your input/output carrier signal so we can pinpoint your location."  
"My location?" I was confused.   
"You'll understand fully later." He had gotten up and was gesturing for me to follow. We went through the door Neo had gone through into a room with what looked to be a somewhat elaborate computer setup. Morpheus joined Neo behind the screen. Trinity took me over to the lone chair in the center of the room. She sat me down and took my coat off, then put a handful of EKG-ish monitor leads on me.   
"These will help us monitor your vitals. This may be a little weird." She dropped a pair of headphones- connected to the computer over my ears. "Mouse, have we got a connection yet?"   
The boy behind the computer-Mouse-shook his head. "Almost." Neo unplugged one wire and plugged it into a different port. Mouse's eyebrows went up an inch.   
"Oh... Okay. We've got a connection. " There was a modem dialing through the headphones, then I got a bunch of quiet computer static.   
There was a glass of water sitting on the table the computer was on. I blinked at it. It looked for all the world to me like the glass and the water in it had not only combined, but the whole thing was slumping in on itself slowly. Warily, I put one hand out to pick it up. As I touched it, it felt malleable. Surprised, I pulled back. A thick thread of glass stayed stuck to my palm, like clear, cold Silly Putty. Before I could think fast enough to wipe it off, the thread connecting the glob on my hand to the glass broke, and it congealed in my palm. As I watched, it slowly spread out, becoming thinner like honey or syrup and covering my hand. It looked like I was wearing a glass glove. Then it started to crawl up my arm.   
"Oh... cold... cold...." It was freezing. I held my arm out away from my body like it was toxic. The syrupy glass stuff slurped its way up to my shoulder.   
"Don't we have a lock yet?" I dimly heard Neo asking someone.   
"Not yet... Mouse! It's replicating!" Trinity said. There were sounds of someone looking for something, and then Mouse's voice.  
"Almost there...."  
The glassy stuff had crawled up under my hair, along my scalp and up under my chin. As it got to my lip I opened my mouth and screamed.   
  
Blackness.  
  
I opened my eyes. Everything was murky. I couldn't see. I couldn't breathe. I was floating. Something in my throat. Pull it out. Throw it away. Hands, searching, no air, pushing. Something giving. A hole. Rip it wider... I shoved my head through the hole in the membrane and gasped for air. Gagging and coughing, I wiped at my eyes and looked around. I was in this pod-dy thing that was sticking out of some kind of huge machine. The pod was filled with red stuff the consistency of almost solidified Jell-O. As I looked to the sides, it slowly dawned on me what I was looking at. More of these pod-things, with something in them-people-in them. There were thousands, millions, billions of the pods-everywhere the eye could see-every one with a person inside. I held on to the end of the pod and peered over the edge. More pods, as far down as the eye could see. I shivered and backed into my pod further, hunkered over, my knees to my chest. I was tangled in something-lifting my arm out, I realized what it was - cables- coming out of... *coming out of ports in my arms. coming out of ports in my legs coming out of my back, my chest, my head.* I put my hands up to what seemed to be the major jack- the one into the back of my head, and realized what had been missing, why my head had seemed incredibly light. All of my hair was gone. All three years without a haircut, just to get it to grow. Gone. All of it. That made me just mad enough to give the head-cable a sharp yank. It was pointless. I was scared and cold and alone with god-knows how many dead-looking people, I had cables coming out of my body....  
"Dammit! I didn't mean the internet I.V. line literally, you pieces of shit!" I yelled out into the stifling silence, suddenly mad. Without warning, a sliver blob dropped down in front of me. It was a robot of some sort. It shot a silvery apparatus out at me and grabbed a hold of the head-cable. It pulled me up out of the guck, and seemed to look me over. Then, just as abruptly, it dropped me and sped away. There was a noise behind me like a computer powering down, and then it happened. With a high pitched whir, the head-cable unwound itself and yanked the four-inch needle that had been inside my skull out. I screamed bloody murder against the pain. With a long series of clicks, all the other cables disconnected and I slumped over the side of the pod. There was a grinding noise. I looked up and saw some sort of hole at the end of the pod. I tried to hold on, but it was worthless. The liquid swirled away, taking me with it.   
I half fell and half slid through a long pipe, washed away with the dirty bath water. The pipe ended abruptly and I fell into a pool of liquid. I went under, fighting back to the top under the waterfall of liquid on top of me. I was in the middle of the pool, whatever it was. Wherever it was. My first instinct was to swim, to find the shore, but all I was able to manage was a weak dog paddle, and soon even that tired me. I gave in to the blackness.   
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
  
  
"Easy, easy... Don't whack it against the sides, it's the only one we've got." Trinity was helping Mouse and Tank lower a claw-ish thing into the muck below the ship. From far below, it closed with a series of clicks. Trinity looked down through the hole.   
"Okay, you've got her. Bring it up slowly. Don't slam her against anything." Mouse pulled the control back. Above, the spool holding the metallic rope started to turn slowly, winding the cable back into the ship. Behind Mouse, Neo and Morpheus kept an eye on the screen showing the view from the bottom of the claw. Tank went over to stand on the other side of the hole from Trinity. He helped steady the claw as it came through the hole with its precious cargo.   
"To the right, and then drop it." Mouse obligingly swung the claw over to the right, then lowered it until it was resting on the deck and unlocked the holding clamps on it. Neo, Trinity and Morpheus gathered around the thing the claw had left on the floor.   
  
Cold, wet, and unconscious, it was Flux.   
  
After quickly getting the claw hooked back onto the ceiling and out of the way, Tank brought a huge blanket over to cover the shivering Flux. Neo and Morpheus lifted her onto the table and covered her in thermal blankets, trying to get her body temperature back up to normal. Trinity hooked two electrical monitors to her temples and then into a socket under a small screen. Morpheus wrapped a smaller thermal over her bald head, as Tank straightened out the I.V. cable and inserted the needle into a socket near the girl's elbow. She shifted slightly as it went in. Tank paused, then pushed it the rest of the way.  
"Check her eyes." Morpheus said as he looked at the reading on the monitor.   
Mouse lifted her eyelid and shone a light in her eyes.   
"Looks normal to me." He shrugged.   
Tank finished connecting monitoring cables to the girl and stepped back. Trinity and Neo tucked the last blanket in around her. Neo stood back with Tank and Trinity checked the vitals on the monitor over her head.   
"I'll take first watch." she said quietly. "We'll have to start on rebuilding tomorrow. I can get some of that set up tonight." Morpheus put a hand on her shoulder and left. Mouse gave her a thumbs-up and followed Tank and Neo out. Trinity sighed and put one hand on Flux's forehead.   
"Welcome to the real world."  
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
  
Neo wandered back in a few hours later to bring Trinity a bowl of the oatmeal-y protein-food they all lived on. She looked up as he came in.   
"Thought you might be hungry." he offered.  
"Hmm?... Oh. Thanks." She took the bowl and set it down on the table next to the chair she had been sitting in.   
"How's she doing?"  
Trinity went over to the screen showing the girl's vitals.   
"She's doing about as well as can be expected. Her core temperature's back up closer to where it should be."  
Neo shook his head.   
"I went through all this." It was somewhere in between a statement and a question. Trinity looked up at him quizzically.  
"It's just... weird to see someone else like this. What I remember of it... geez. I wouldn't wish it on anyone else."  
"It's always kind of hard to watch the first one after you and to know... to remember what you went through. I went through the same thing when pulled Cypher out-ten years ago. When we got Switch and Apoc I wasn't in as bad shape as I was the first time. Don't worry, you'll get over it. If there's anything I can do for you, just say it."   
Neo sighed. "Thanks... Do you need any help? For some reason I don't think I'm going to be able to sleep."  
"If you're up to it, you could help me get all of the stuff together so we could start rebuilding her." Trinity brought a spoonful of the food to her lips.   
"Rebuilding?"   
"We did it to you too, don't worry. It sounds worse than it is. In the pods, you never get a chance to use your muscles. They atrophy. When you come out, you have to have your muscles worked or you'll never be able to move on your own. That's why we're keeping such a close eye on her. If her heart gets weak enough that it stops, we want to be able to catch it in time. That's what one of the wires is. On everybody there's certain port that has a direct connection to the heart. It changes from person to person, but on most it's one of the chest sockets."   
"How do you know which one it is... how do you figure it out?" Neo asked.   
"Here, hold on." Trinity put the bowl down and took one of the coiled cables off of the wall. "Take your shirt off."   
Neo did as he was told. Trinity plugged one end of the cable into an unused monitor and the other into the jack on the left side of Neo's chest. The monitor lit up with a red line showing his heartbeat and an image of his heart, hard at work.   
"You see how the line's red? That tells us that it's the main line. If I were to plug it in here," she took the cable out and put it in the port on the other side of his chest. "it's green, and you don't have the image of the heart, telling us it's not the main line." She pulled the cable out of Neo's chest, wound it back up and put it back on its peg. "On Flux, here, her main line is in the front of her shoulder." Trinity peeled back the thermal blankets to show Neo, then tucked them back in around the girl. "Uncommon but not unheard of. Mouse's is the back of his shoulder. I think it's recent thing, so the younger you are the more likely you are to have a shoulder jack."   
"So the arrangement of... things... ports... on people... change?" Neo asked, trying to straighten everything out in his mind.   
Trinity nodded. "Everyone usually has around the same number, but there's no given arrangement for where they'll be. They put them in when you're still in fetal stage, so there's not really any good way to make sure they don't move all around as you grow."   
"But she still has the head socket?"   
"There are a few that never move-the head and the ones down the spine. Everyone has those. Here, why don't you help me get things sorted out for tomorrow? There's a blue drawer over there, pull it out and bring it to the table."   
As Neo brought the drawer over, Trinity cleared off the high table to the side of the room. He put the drawer on the table and drug a stool over. Trinity took out one of the fleecy rolls of fabric and rolled it out on the table. Inside were at least twenty of the acupuncture-like needles Neo remembered having stuck in his flesh at one time.   
"We have to make sure that all of the wires in these are still good. Temperature disagrees with them, and when the heater went out last week half of them probably died." Trinity explained. She dug under the fabric rolls still in the drawer and pulled out a thing that looked almost like a miniature surge protector-powerstrip. It had eight small holes along the top and a plug coming out of the side. Trinity plugged it into a power socket on the table, then took eight of the needles and put them in the holes. Eight little green lights lit up on the side.   
"There. All of these are working. Pretty basic."  
Neo nodded and unrolled another needle holder. Trinity took the good needles out and put them aside.  
  
%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%**%*%%  
  
Thirty minutes later, they had gotten through the majority of the needles and there were two piles on the table, one much smaller than the other. Trinity put the last eight needles in the tester and plucked that three dead ones in the bunch out.   
"I'll have to see if Tank-" she began.  
The lights went out. There was the whine of something electrical powering down. Then another noise-a quiet humming that gradually worked up to speed. The battery powered lights on the ceiling and the monitor over Flux's head flickered on. Both Neo and Trinity looked up.   
"Damn." Trinity spat through clenched teeth.   
"Sentinels?" Neo asked. Trinity nodded.  
"They're the only thing that would put us into a complete powerdown." She opened a locker in the wall and took out two flashlights. Tossing one to Neo, she flipped hers on and checked on Flux. There was a crash outside the door. Two flashlight beams swung towards the noise. Neo slowly opened the door. Mouse was outside, tangled in a bundle of loose cable on the floor. Trinity hurried out and helped Neo untangle him, then herded everyone back into the room.   
"Sorry..." Mouse whispered. "Morpheus sent me down. We've got eight sentinels on our tail."   
"Eight!?" Neo said in disbelief. Mouse nodded.   
"If we have to use the EMP, it'll kill the monitoring systems on her..." Mouse gestured to Flux.  
"It'll knock the battery powered monitors out?" Trinity asked. Mouse nodded again.  
"Morpheus and Tank boosted the amplitude-it'll get anything within a mile now."  
"Is there a way we could turn the system off just for the minute the EMP takes to disperse, and then turn it on again? Would that keep it from shorting out, or is there enough residual energy?" Neo offered as a suggestion.  
"That would work, but how do we know when-" There was a high pitched shriek and the ship shook. Everything went dark again.   
"-the EMP will go off." Trinity finished her sentence. "Damn." She turned the flashlight switch off, then on again and used the weak beam of light to illuminate the now-dead monitor. Opening a panel under it, she flipped a switch off then on again. It came on, then flickered and promptly died.   
"Shit! He must have totally drained the battery cells too. How much did he boost that thing?"   
Mouse looked at Neo. Neo shrugged.  
"I didn't think it was that much. He said he'd taken power from propulsion-maybe the wires got crossed."  
"I hope so!" Trinity lifted one of Flux's eyelids. "She's still out cold... You guys stay here. I'm going to see what's going on."  
  
  
Up on the bridge, Morpheus was watching the sentinels carefully, and communicating with Tank down on the main deck running the EMP. The first eight sentinels had been powered down permanently by the pulse, but unfortunately, three more had been hiding just out of range and had zipped in as soon as the batteries had been drained. Trinity burst in.  
"What's-"  
"Sshhh!" Tank's voice cut her off. "Quiet!"  
Trinity opened her mouth to snap back at him.   
"Trinity." Morpheus' voice had a calming effect. "Look." Trinity looked out the window. Her jaw dropped. Floating in front of the Nebuchadnezzar were three of the biggest, most evil looking sentinels that she had ever seen.   
"Jee-zus." she breathed. and sat down in one of the conn-seats.  
"We're dead in the water until the EMP recharges." Morpheus explained.   
"39% recharged." Tank reported.  
The lead sentinel sent out a scanning laser, starting at the back of the ship and scanning forwards, looking for life signs.   
Trinity shook her head. "If they attack, we're scrap metal."  
"Shh," Morpheus shushed them. "Remember, they can hear us."  
"47% charged." Tank reported in a whisper. Trinity ducked under the control panel she was sitting in front of and pulled a green wire out of the central spider. Reaching behind the half-open wall panel, she found a triple-braided wire of blue, purple and white, and touched it's bare end to the end of the green wire.   
"Jeez!" Tank exclaimed. "95% charged. Whad'd you do?"   
"Don't ask. Hand me the tape over there." Morpheus reached across the console and handed the tape to Trinity, who wrapped a strip of it around the connection.  
"100% charged. Whenever you're ready." Tank's finger hovered over the button.   
"Not yet." Morpheus looked out at the sentinels. Trinity climbed backwards out from under the control panel. She flipped the switch on the sonar reading screen. Two large blips appeared, and three smaller energy signatures hiding farther away.   
"Morpheus, there's three more hiding."  
"Are they in range?"  
"Barely, but yes."  
As if on cue, the two larger sentinels moved, one circling around to cover the tail of the ship and the other staying in front. The three smaller ones zipped out of hiding and headed towards the ship.  
"They're powering lasers..." Trinity reported.  
"Tank, now."  
The high pitched shriek again, and the ship rocked. Down below, Neo and Mouse grabbed onto anything that didn't move to keep from falling over. The blast dissipated and the five deactivated sentinels fell to the ground.   
"No more in sonar range. We're safe." Trinity stood up and left by flashlight beam, going back down to rejoin Mouse and Neo.   
  
  
  
Mouse looked up from where he was working on the broken needles as Trinity came in, Tank following. Tank went over to join Mouse on the needles. Trinity walked over to where Neo was keeping track of Flux's pulse.   
"Any change?" she asked. Neo looked up.  
"She seems to be doing okay."  
Trinity nodded.  
"We drained the battery pretty well-it's going to be a while before we can bring the Neb back up to speed." She put a hand on Neo's shoulder and moved behind him, flipping the switch on the monitor. It came on, but flickered periodically. Neo let go of Flux's wrist and tucked her arm back under the thermal blankets. The steady line showing her heartbeat appeared, and everyone in the room breathed a sigh of relief.   
"She'll be fine." Trinity said, and put a hand on the girl's forehead. Flux stirred, opening one eye and then the other.   
"Mmmpph... Where am I?" she asked, hoarse and groggy.   
"The real world." Trinity told her. "Don't worry, just sleep now." Flux half-nodded and closed her eyes again. Twenty minutes later, Morpheus came in, checking on the girl's progress. One by one everyone filtered out and into their bed, leaving Trinity alone with the sleeping girl.   
  
  
Flux floated in and out of consciousness the next day, the first time she was aware at all as Trinity and Morpheus were starting to put the needles into the muscles in her legs. She let out a kind of half-awake whimpering moan and swatted at the needle. Morpheus caught her wrist.  
"Flux. Wake up."   
The girl frowned and turned her head away from him, trying to pull her arm away.   
"Flux." Trinity said. The girl's eyes opened wide, and then squinted shut again.  
"It's so bright..."   
"Your eyes aren't used to light. You've never had them open before." Morpheus explained to her. Trinity put another needle into the flesh just below her knee, and Flux started, trying to sit up.   
"What are you doing to me?"   
"We're rebuilding your muscles." Trinity explained.  
"Lie still." Morpheus put a hand on her forehead and gently pushed her back down. Her eyes closed and she went back to sleep.   
  
  
It took a week of constant rebuilding before Morpheus and Trinity were satisfied with Flux. She woke up, discombobulated and somewhat cold in a normal bed aboard the Neb, in what had been Switch's 'room'. Her eyes were sleep-sticky. She brought her arm up and rubbed the back of her hand over them, then realized there was some sort of weight dragging from her arm. Sitting up and shaking her head slightly, she inspected. Coming from a socket in her arm was a black wire. Taking hold of it near the connection, she pulled gently.   
*click* The magnetic catch holding the needle connected to the wire still in the socket let go and she pulled it out. Holding it up, she followed the wire back to what looked like a very low-tech I.V. bag. With a chuckle- *all that technology for an I.V?* she looped the wire and the needle around the hook holding the bag, and inspected her surroundings.   
She was wearing a beat-up old lavender-y sweater over a gray thermal shirt- both with sleeves just a tad too long, black pants and beat up black boots. "Now how did they know my favorite color was purple?" she wondered out loud, then shrugged. It didn't matter, really. It was common knowledge at school that her favorite color was purple. The room was small, like it was on a submarine... gunmetal and silver... rivets showing in the walls. The door had a circular-lock wheel in the center. As Flux looked at it, the door swung open to admit Morpheus. Without a word, he came in and sat down in a chair across from Flux. She remained silent. Moments passed as they both sat and looked at the other.   
"You have many questions, Flux." Morpheus finally broke the silence. "Come. I will answer as many as I can." He stood and ushered Flux out the door, draping a blanket over her shoulders as she left.  
  
He led her down a narrow hallway to a ladder-well, and up the ladder.   
"This is my ship, the Nebuchadnezzar. It's a hovercraft. Small like a submarine. It's dark. It's cramped and cold. But it's home.." Morpheus pointed to the plaque on the wall bearing the ship name, place and date built. Flux looked at it, and her forehead wrinkled.  
"But.." Flux was hoarse. She cleared her throat and tried again. "It says built in 2000... But the year's just begun.... hasn't it...?"   
Morpheus slowly smiled.   
"You are catching on quickly, Flux. Things aren't always what they seem. In reality, it is closer to the year 2200. We have no way of telling exactly."   
"Twenty-two-hundred?" Flux was amazed. "That's... bloody... amazing!"  
Morpheus' smile grew bigger.   
"Come." He led her past a wall full of tangled wires, and through a cut-out door into an open area the size of a school cafeteria. "This," he gestured around them. "is the main deck." Trinity stood up from where she was putting a rivet back in the wall and nodded to Flux.  
"This is my crew. Most of them you've met already... Trinity, Neo, and one behind the chair is Mouse. At the control panel is Tank." Tank nodded towards Flux in greeting. Morpheus continued. "Flux, you told me you wanted to know what the Matrix was. Now is your chance to find out. Trinity."  
Trinity took Flux by the shoulders and steered her over into one of the seven chairs the crew used when in the Matrix. She took the blanket off of Flux's shoulders, and helped her get situated. Tank handed her the needle connector.   
"This may feel strange. Brace yourself." Trinity warned the girl. As the needle went in, Flux made a face in between a grimace and yawn. Her eyes closed, and she was inside the Matrix.   
A moment later, Morpheus followed.  
  
She opened her eyes again and was immediately confused She was standing in a white...room? Place? It was just that... white... as far as the eye could see.   
"What is the place?" she asked the air.   
"This is what we call the Construct." Morpheus' voice came from behind her. She turned and saw him standing there, leaning on one of the chairs from the room in the Joyce Hotel. The two chairs, an old-looking TV and a small end table had appeared seemingly out of nowhere. "It's our loading program. From this place, we can load anything we need, clothing, weapons, transportation, household objects, training programs, virus protection."  
Flux's eyebrows went up an inch.   
"This is a program?"   
Morpheus nodded once.  
"Jee-zus." Flux breathed. "I'm inside a computer program."  
"Is it extremely hard to believe? There is evidence this is not the real world. You're wearing different clothes. The sockets in your arms and head are gone. Your hair is longer."  
Flux's hand flew to her head, feeling for the port in back. She held a handful of curly brown hair out so she could see it.   
"Jee-zus!"  
"This is what we call a residual self image, a mental projection of your digital self."   
"So this isn't real... this isn't really me?"  
"How do you define real?" Morpheus asked, gesturing for her to sit down. Flux perched on the arm of the other chair. "What is real? If you're talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see, then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain." Morpheus plucked the TV remote off of the end table and flicked the t.v. on. There was a shot of a big city, time exposed to show the lights of the traffic and buildings that looked reasonably like the background to the Madonna music video 'Ray of Light'. *But* Flux reminded herself *that was never a real music video.* "This is the world that you know. The world as it was at the end of the twentieth century. It exists now only as part of a neural-interactive simulation that we call the Matrix. You have been living in that simulation, Flux. You have been living in a virtual world." Morpheus continued. He pushed another button on the remote control. The TV switched to show a picture of a ruined city-majestic still, but crumbling into nothing, scoured by the winds that rushed the thick clouds across the dark sky. There was a whirring noise. Flux blinked. When she opened her eyes again, she was standing inside the scene that had been on the television, looking at the city from a plateau less than five miles away. Taken aback, she stood up and held onto the back of the chair. Morpheus continued.  
"This is the world as it exists today.... Welcome to the Desert of the Real. We have only bits and pieces of information but what we know for certain is that at some point in the early twenty-first century all of mankind was united in celebration. We marveled at our own magnificence as we gave birth to technology."   
"The computer. The microchip. Silicon Valley." Flux recited.  
"A single invention that spawned an entire race of machines. We don't know who struck first, us or them. But we know that it was us that scorched the sky. At the time they were dependent on solar power and it was believed that they would be unable to survive without an energy source as abundant as the sun. Throughout human history, we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. The human body generates more bio-electricity than a 120-volt battery and over 25,000 BTU's body heat. Combined with a form of fusion the machines have found all the energy they would ever need. There are fields, endless fields, where human beings are no longer born, we are grown." The TV which had been transported along with the chairs and table out onto the plateau, switched to show a red orb... a baby inside it. A machine swung up and unhooked the baby-orb. The shot pulled back. There were more orbs... on a stalk.... then more stalks. Ten. A hundred. A thousand, then millions and millions. "For the longest time I wouldn't believe it, and then I saw the fields with my own eyes." Morpheus forged on. "Watched them liquefy the dead so they could be fed intravenously to the living. And standing there, facing the pure horrifying precision, I came to realize the obviousness of the truth. What is the Matrix? Control. The Matrix is a computer generated dream world built to keep us under control in order to change a human being into this." They were back in the white place... the Construct... and Morpheus was holding up a Duracell battery.   
"They turn us into batteries. Power plants. Nothing else"  
  
Back in the real world, on the Neb, Neo, Trinity and Tank watched carefully for Flux's reaction. Neo had one hand over his mouth and was looking a little paler than usual. He made a quiet sound in the back of his throat. Trinity glanced at him, then took his other hand, squeezing it gently.   
"She's taking it well." she whispered.  
"Better than I did, you mean." Neo whispered back.  
"You were older... more... set in your ways.... and beliefs." She squeezed his hand again.   
"I still feel weird thinking about all that... what I went through..." He shook his head and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Trinity slipped an arm around his waist.   
"You're fine now."   
They both turned their attention back to Flux and Morpheus in the Construct. Flux had sat down on the arm of one of the chairs. Morpheus handed her the phone receiver. She took it and dazed, brought it to her ear. Trinity slipped away from Neo, and went over to unhook Flux.   
  
The girl jerked back into the real world, breathing hard. Trinity pulled the connecting needle out of the back of her skull and helped her sit up. Flux's eyes were glazed and she moved as if she were sleeping. Without a word, she stood up and started for the ladder down to her quarters. Four steps away, she collapsed, falling to the deck. Silently, Neo came over, scooped her up, and helped Trinity take her down to her room, leaving Tank to unhook Morpheus.   
  
Neo put Flux down on the bed and pulled the cover over her. Trinity sat on the edge of the bed and put one hand on Flux's forehead.   
"She took it well, considering." Trinity said, looking at the girl.   
"She didn't react the way I did."  
"She tried to figure it out-to think it through. Her brain overloaded, and she passed out. You took the more emotional path. What you did, what she did- they're both mild forms of shock. She'll be fine as soon as she sleeps it off." Trinity stood up and brushed her hands off on her thighs. "Lunch?" Neo nodded, and followed Trinity out, glancing back at the sleeping girl.   
  
  
Morpheus was sitting in a chair across from her bed when she woke up later that day.   
"It was all real, wasn't it," she whispered, facing the wall. "That the sky is scorched and the machines rule us. It wasn't a dream."  
"It was no dream."  
"Everyone I know... I knew... everything I ever used, held... it was all a virtual reality?"   
"Yes." Morpheus stood. "Sleep now. Your training begins tomorrow."  
As he left, Flux sat up, putting her hands up to her head to run her fingers through her hair the way she did when she was agitated. Realizing that the action was pointless with her centimeter-long hair, she settled for rubbing her temples instead.   
"How can I sleep?" she whispered. Her brain was going a million miles an hour, giving her a splitting headache. She lay back and just stared at the ceiling.  
  
That was the way Tank found her when he went in to wake her up the next morning.   
"How did you sleep?"  
"Didn't." Flux answered, still staring at the ceiling.  
"You will tonight." He offered a hand. Flux looked at him, then sat up and took the hand. "I'm Tank. I'll be your operator."   
"Operator?"  
"I run programs for you, basically. I'm really looking forward to seeing how you do. Come on." He helped her up off of the bed, holding the door for her on their way out and then taking the lead.   
"You don't... have any... sockets?" Flux noticed, looking at the back of his head.   
"Me? Nope. I'm 100% organically home-grown human. Pure and direct from Zion."   
"Zion?"  
"The last human city-deep underground where it's still warm near the earth's core. If we won the war tomorrow, the party would be there. And it would be one hell of a party, let me tell you. Sooner or later, you're probably going to get to go there. Here we go." Tank helped Flux into one of the reclining chairs and put the connecting needle into her head before jumping into the control chair.   
"Let's see." she shuffled through a handful of mini-disks. "In all honesty, we're supposed to start with command protocol and all that boring shit, but we had some fun with this one program before... if I can find it." He checked under a rag draped over one of the monitors. "Ah-ha. Here it is." Tank pushed the disk into the drive. "Combat training."  
"Combat training?" Flux echoed. The screen over her head lit up. "Kung-fu?"   
There was a click as the disk stopped loading. Flux's eyes widened then snapped shut. Underneath the lids, her eyes moved rapidly. and her whole body went tense. Her eyes flew open again and she panted for breath. A huge grin spread over her face.  
"You like that, huh?" Tank asked, grinning. "You want more?"  
"Oh yeah!"   
Tank hit another button and the disk started to rapidly download into the girl's brain, cycling through every different type of hand-to hand combat known to man.  
  
Two hours later Trinity came in to check on her progress. She paused in front of the girl, watching her for a moment before joining Tank behind the screens.   
"She's holding it?" Trinity asked.  
"She's soaking it in."  
"Younger brain, more open to learning."  
"Like a sponge!"  
Trinity smiled and patted him on the shoulder before leaving. Tank nodded, all his attention on the screens in front of him.   
  
For the next six hours, Flux soaked in any and all information she could get. Neo and Morpheus were there when the download finished. The girl's eyes flew open.   
"I'm Superman." she whispered.  
Morpheus leaned over her. "Prove it."  
  
  
There was a second of darkness, then white and then Flux was standing opposite Morpheus in a Japanese-style room, wearing what looked to be gray and purple karate dress. She looked around her.   
"This is a sparring program, similar to the programmed reality of the Matrix. It has the same basic rules, rules like gravity. What you must learn is that these rules are no different that the rules of a computer system. Some of them can be bent. Some of them can be broken. You need to learn the difference. Understand? Then hit me."  
The girl went through an elaborate move that put her in a ready position. Morpheus copied her, waited a second, and then attacked, striking for her stomach. Flux blinked and jumped to the side, bringing her arm around and down. Morpheus took the blow on a forearm and launched a series of attacks on the girl. She blocked all of them, pausing a moment when he did, then kicking strongly upwards. Morpheus grabbed her heel and tried to tumble her onto her back. Rather than fall, she used the extra momentum and managed a total backflip, landing on both feet.   
  
"Jeezus!" Neo breathed, watching outside.   
"She's good." Tank said.  
"She's had dance training." Trinity added, coming up behind the two men to watch the fight.  
  
Morpheus paused only briefly, but it was all Flux needed. She had decided she had had enough of this defensive stuff and it was her turn to attack. The girl let fly a series of blows at Morpheus' head and neck-impressively, as she was at least half a food shorter than he was. He blocked everything she threw at him, then dropped to the ground with a sliding kick that knocked her legs out from under her. With a yell, she landed hard on her butt on the ground.   
"Owww...!" Flux rubbed her tailbone.  
"Good. Modification, spontaneity. Your technique is good."   
"Then why am I on my ass?"   
"You are still thinking. When you learn to free your mind, not to focus on what you can do or can't do, when you learn to move without thinking beforehand, when you learn to instinctively know what to do, then you will be better. Again."  
Almost reluctantly, Flux peeled herself up off of the floor and took another ready pose. Morpheus followed suit, this time allowing Flux to initiate the fight, which she did in spectacular fashion, throwing a series of quick, fast, hard kicks at Morpheus. He blocked them, almost missing the last one as the girl spun on one heel and threw the other leg into the air high enough to decapitate. In the split second as her leg came down and she was off balance, Morpheus gave a tremendous one-handed punch that caught her right in the solar plexus and knocked her sprawling backwards six feet away. Instantly, the girl had spun around and jumped to her feet again, moving to meet Morpheus, catching the first punch he threw and ducking the second one.   
  
"Is he going easy on her?" Mouse had followed everyone else in and was watching the fight. "I mean, because she's so much smaller?"   
"I doubt it." Trinity said. "If she runs into an agent, he's not going to be any easier on her because she's small. Morpheus'll know that, and probably take it into account."  
"Even so, Morpheus' 'easy' isn't really all that easy." Neo muttered.   
  
Morpheus had succeeded in tangling Flux's arms in a way that kept her a foot away from him and unable to use anything but her legs to fight. With a yell, Flux broke the hold and moved away. The two circled each other warily, watching for the other's move. Flux faked, darting in and then back out, drawing Morpheus forward, then jumped up as high as she could and kicked out. Everything seemed to slow down. Morpheus ducked, then grabbed the kicking leg and bodily threw the girl across the room to hit one of the columns and then come to rest on the ground.   
He walked over to where Flux was lying on the ground trying to decide if anything was broken. He leaned over, close to her.   
"How did I beat you?"   
She raised her head, a stormy look in her eyes.  
"You're too damn big and too damn fast."   
"Do you really think size or speed has any influence in this place?"   
She glared at him, and wiped her sweaty forehead off on her sleeve.  
"Do you think you're really sweating?"  
"I know what you're doing." she growled. "Think outside the box. Don't believe everything you see. I've heard it before."  
Morpheus grinned. "Good. Hearing it is the first step. I'm trying to free your mind. I can only show you the door your possibilities lie behind. You have to make the choice to either open it or walk away. Tank. Load the jump program."  
  
Tank tapped out a series of code on the keyboard and hit enter. On the screens, the familiar building roof appeared. Trinity moved to stand next to Neo and put a hand on his arm. He glanced up at her, then focused back on the screen.  
  
There was white, then Flux saw her booted feet flying at something-the roof of a building. She was wearing the same clothes and boots she'd had on in the Construct. Looking around, she didn't recognize the skyline. Morpheus was beside her, she realized as he spoke.   
"You have to let go of your fear, doubt, and disbelief. Free your  
mind." He ran to the edge of the building and jumped, never breaking stride. In one smooth, fluid, amazing motion he was sailing through the air, coat flapping like Superman's cape to land, totally unharmed on the concrete of the other building's roof, seventy feet away.   
Flux stood, mouth agape.  
"Oh. Cool."  
  
Neo's jaw tightened. He reached up and held Trinity's hand as the girl jumped.  
  
"Awesome." She combed both hands through her hair, fluffing it out in nervous habit, then ran at the edge of the building. As her foot hit the edge, she closed her eyes and jumped as hard as she could. She sailed out into mid air, still running. All her thoughts were focused on reaching other side.  
  
"She's gonna make it." Mouse breathed.  
  
Ten feet away from being the only one to ever make the first jump, she opened her eyes and got her first view of how high she was. "Oh SHIT!" she screamed as she looked down. Almost immediately, she started to drop like a stone. Flailing out wildly and using as much forward momentum as she could salvage, she managed to catch the ledge to the roof with one hand. She dangled precariously for a moment before grabbing the ledge with her other hand. She hung for half a second, catching her breath, then hauled herself up onto the roof.   
  
"What does that mean?" Neo whispered, still watching the monitor.   
"I don't know." Trinity replied. Across the room, the girl's chair lowered, and she opened her eyes. Tank was there, taking the spike out of her head, then moving to Morpheus and doing the same. Neo, Trinity and Mouse turned to face them. Flux started to sit up, then leaned back in her chair with a groan. Lifting her shirt, she inspected the huge purple bruise on her stomach.   
"I thought you said it wasn't real."  
"Your mind makes it real." Morpheus replied.  
"So if you're shot, or hurt in the Matrix, it shows up on your body here?"  
In silent reply, Mouse walked over and pulled his shirt off over his head, showing her the scars from the Agent's weapons.   
"God." she breathed, leaning forward and gently touching one of the round scars. "What happened?"   
"Agents. They cut the hard line and then trapped me-us in the safe house. I was the first one they met. After they thought I was dead- my heart stopped for, like, half a minute, somehow I managed to get to the other phone in the safe house, and get out. Dozer- Tank's brother, hauled me into the infirmary and hooked me up to life support. I almost didn't make it." he whispered.  
She looked at him, her eyes full of sympathy, then stood up and hugged him. "I'm sorry."   
Taken aback, he put his arms around her briefly too. Trinity and Neo shared a small smile, and from behind Morpheus, Tank grinned. Flux stepped back and yawned.   
"Mmph... tired! I'm going to go sleep for another five hours." She disappeared around the control panel in the direction of the ladder.  
Tank let out a soft whoop. "Yeah, Mouse!" Mouse turned red and yanked his shirt back down over his head, jamming the hat over his reddening ears. Without a word, he stalked off towards the other ladder, Neo and Trinity both patting him good naturedly on the back as he went.   
  
In the middle of the night, Flux woke up, cold and sore. She wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and wandered up to the main deck where Neo was in Tank's chair watching the scrolling green code of the Matrix. She walked up behind him and watched the characters for a minute. Neo realized there was someone behind him and turned to see who it was.  
"Oh... hi. What are you doing up?" He stretched his arms over his head, leaning back in the chair to see her.  
"Woke up and couldn't get back to sleep... I'm sore all over."  
"Yeah, I know how that goes. Morpheus doesn't exactly hit lightly, does he?"  
Flux shook her head emphatically, making Neo smile.   
"Is that the Matrix?" she asked, pointing to the screens. Neo nodded.  
"Yep."  
"Do you always look at it in code out here?"   
"The image translators only work for the Construct- there's too much information for them to handle onscreen." He shivered.   
"Cold?" Flux asked.  
"No, just a really bad case of deja vu. I had a conversation like this with Cypher right after I had been freed, and right before he went postal and killed Switch, Dozer and Apoc. Bad memories, that's all."   
"I'm sorry." She looked away.  
"It's not your fault. Quit apologizing. If you apologize for everything that goes wrong, you'll have no breath left."  
That got the smile he had been trying for out of the girl.   
"I just feel so out of place and on the outside, like an elephant in a hamster tube trying to fit in."   
Neo shook his head. "It's only for the first week or two it feels like that. Then you start being able to jump into things just as fast as everyone else. You're doing fine."   
The dejected look was back on the girl's face.   
"Hey... don't...." Neo had an idea. "Come here." He held his hand out to her. She shuffled forward, intrigued. He put an arm around her shoulders and pointed at the screen.   
"Do you see anything?"   
She shook her head.  
"It's like one of those Magic Eye things. Try crossing your eyes just a little bit and looking again."  
Flux did as she was told. She saw people, outlines, moving around.  
"Whoa!" She grinned. "That's awesome!"  
"Isn't it?" Her smile was infectious. "After a while you won't even need to squint to see it, either. Now, feel better?"  
"A little bit."   
Neo took his arm back from around her shoulder and typed something in to the keyboard. The screen in front of them switched over to a schematic of the Nebuchadnezzar.   
"You know, you embarrassed Mouse today."  
"I didn't mean to." Flux said. "I just thought... I mean, that must have been a hard story to tell... a hard experience to relive, especially in front of everyone... I hug people a lot..." She crossed her arms and looked away.   
Neo chuckled.  
"No, let me say that a different way. He acted like he was embarrassed, but in all honesty, I think he liked it."  
Flux looked up, an evilly-amused look on her face.  
"Oh.. embarrassed that way, huh?"  
"Yeah... don't tell him I said this, but I think he's got a thing for you."  
She snorted. "There's a first. Guys don't usually go for girls who have more technical knowledge than they do."  
"Yeah, well, girls don't usually go for guys who spend all their time in front of a computer either, so it all balances out in the end, I guess."  
"I guess." Flux yawned. "God, I'm tired again now. I feel like all I've been doing is eating, sleeping and thinking too hard."  
"And apologizing."   
"Shut up!" She gave him a good-natured whack on the shoulder. and they both laughed. "Thanks for making me feel better about this whole thing."  
"No problem. Everyone else did it for me when I came out... and I think I had it tougher than you, trying to live up to expectations-you know about that, don't you?."  
"I don't know...." Flux shrugged the blanket back up onto her shoulder.  
"I'm the One... inside the Matrix, I can do just about anything. And when I first came out, they expected me to do just that... everything. It took until I-we almost lost Trinity before I started to believe that I could be the One at all. Then when I died and came back to life, that was the real clincher. You don't have anything like that hanging over your head, watching your every move."  
"I guess not. I had no clue about the One thing, though."   
"It's not that obvious. Out here, I'm just another scrawny new guy on the crew. It's not until we're in the Matrix I can do anything all that wonderful."  
She yawned again. "Hey-hug?"  
Neo paused for a second, then smiled.  
"Yeah, sure."   
She gave him a quick hug and started back for her room.  
"G'nite, Flux." Neo called after her.  
"You too!" she called back, and climbed down the ladder. As soon as she got into her bed she was asleep, curled up under the fuzzy blanket. As Neo came down to his bed, he peeked in to check on her, smiling as he saw her sleeping form. *She's gonna do just fine.*  
  
%*%*%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%* %*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%  
  
The lights came on early the next morning, waking everyone but Flux up. Halfway through breakfast, she wandered into the mess hall, somewhat bleary-eyed with a blanket around her shoulders.  
"The dead awake!" Tank commented. Flux gave him a nasty look and sat down on the near end of the bench next to Neo and across from Mouse. Trinity got up and splopped some of the goopy protein food into a bowl for the girl. Flux looked at it rather strangely, then hesitantly picked up the spoon.   
"It's not as bad as it looks." Trinity commented, in between mouthfuls.  
"Well, it looks pretty darn bad."   
"Close your eyes." Mouse offered. "Tastes like watery oatmeal then."  
"My favorite food." She tasted it. Her nose wrinkled. "Well..." She took another spoonful. "It doesn't really taste like anything."  
"It's just the consistency that makes it nasty." Mouse explained.   
"Really, it's just protein with aminos, vitamins and minerals... all synthetic, of course." Tank told Flux.  
"So it's kind of like tofu.... tastes like nothing, has a crummy consistency and is supposedly good for you."  
"Basically." Tank answered.  
"Well... here's to the runny tofu." She lifted a spoonful in salute, then joined everyone else in eating.  
  
Three fourths of the way through her bowl, Morpheus came in, pouting his own breakfast and joining the rest of the crew at the table.  
"Tank. Trinity. Neo. We're going to be running 'Agent' today, as soon as we're done. I'd like you in with us." Trinity and Neo nodded. Tank stood up and went over to the sink, rinsing his bowl and then disappearing in the direction of the main deck to get things set up. Flux slurped the last bit of the goop off her spoon, then rinsed her bowl out at the sink too. Trinity was waiting for her as she finished. Neo and Morpheus had left, presumably to the same place Tank had gone.  
"Come on." Trinity took her out the door and up to the main deck. Mouse, not wanting to be left alone in the mess hall, followed them.   
  
When they got to the main deck, Trinity left Mouse to get Flux hooked up. Flux had absolutely no clue what was going on, but followed Mouse gamely. She hopped up into the chair and watched as Mouse typed something into the screen above her head.   
"There we go." he said when it beeped back at him. He paused, and looked up at Flux. "How're ya doing?"   
She shrugged. "Tired. Didn't get much sleep last night."  
Mouse self-consciously looked back down at the screen. "Yeah," he muttered to himself. "Me neither."   
Trinity came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Ready?" she asked, looking at both Flux and Mouse. They both nodded. "Okay. Mouse.. if you want to hook us up..." She went over to start the boot up program over another chair. Flux leaned back and waited for Mouse to put the connecting spike into the back of her head. She barely felt it slip in before her eyes closed.   
  
There was a flash of white, then she was standing outside in a park. Turning around, she recognized it as one of Portland's park blocks.... there was the historical society, and the art museum... Morpheus, Neo and Trinity were standing behind her, and she jumped a little as she saw them.   
Morpheus smiled.   
"I thought you might like a little fresh air. When you find one of us, we'll go home again." The three started to disperse, all walking in different directions. "Count to thirty, then feel free to do whatever you like. Oh... and watch out for the agents."   
"Agents?" Flux asked.  
"I believe you've met them before. Look behind you."   
She turned around. Walking down the sidewalk were people, no more or less then on a normal day... there were three Asian ladies talking in a different language, a businessman on a cell phone, a man with a child sitting on the park bench. The most out of the ordinary person she could see was a tall busty blonde in a short, skintight red dress and four inch heels to match. Flux looked back to Morpheus for advice.   
He was gone.  
She looked back.   
The woman in red had turned into one of the Secret-Service Rogaine men-what they called an Agent, she realized in a split second- and was holding a gun to Flux's head. Instinctively, the girl ducked. Hearing the gunshot over her head, she dropped to the ground and rolled behind one of the abstract stone sculptures lining the sidewalk. Taking a second, and only a second to catch her breath, she gathered her legs up under her and took off across the park towards the street and the alley in between the historical society and the Lutheran church on the corner.   
Heart pounding, she dodged the parked cars on the street and flew into the narrow alley. Ducking behind a garbage can, she looked around for her options. There was the opposite end of the alley, up the fire escape on the side of the buildings, through the back door or out the way she had come. There were footsteps at the end of the alley, making her decision for her. Staying as low as she could, she ran out the opposite end of the alley, across the street, narrowly missing being hit by a car and into the parking garage across the street. Flux made almost one full loop of the first floor, seeing the back of the agent she was running from before darting out the exit and looping around the back of the building.   
*Find Trinity* she chanted silently to herself *Find Neo* *Find Morpheus* Glancing both ways, she took off towards the center of town... the shopping district, where she hoped she could lose her agent tail in the crowds of people.  
  
She reached the outskirts of the open-air market in record time, panting for breath. Pausing for a moment, she dropped her head and braced her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath again. Flux raised her head to assess her situation, and looked right into the barrel of a second agent's gun.  
"Shit!" she cried, and threw herself to one side and towards the ground. Rolling for a few feet, she scrambled to her hands and knees and started crawling her way through the market, underneath the tarps of the stands, virtually unseen. Reaching the end of the row and the last stand tarp, she peeked out from underneath, looking for the agent's distinctive shoes. Nothing. She exhaled, and crawled out, directly behind a third agent. *What the HELL? Where did he come from?* As she got to her feet to run, he turned, raising his gun. Gritting her teeth, she ducked her head and ran towards the light-rail station under the bridge. There was a familiar figure leaning on the ticket dispenser machine.   
"Trinity!" Flux screamed. "TRINITY!"   
Almost nonchalantly, Trinity looked up and pulled a cellular phone out of her pocket, sliding it open and saying something into it. Flux ran up to her. Trinity gave the girl the phone. Sighing in relief, Flux took it, putting it to her ear, and turned to glance behind her. All three agents were standing there, guns leveled at her head. She screamed and disappeared. The agents froze in place. Trinity leaned down, picked the cellular up and held it to her ear. She disappeared, and with a fizz, the agents dematerialized. The white of the Construct was everywhere once more.  
  
Flux rocketed back into the real world screaming. As soon as her eyes opened, she had jerked forward into an almost fetal position, gasping, regardless of the plug still in the back of her head. Mouse was standing behind her as she came out, and put a hand on her shoulder, twisting the plug out and putting it away quickly. He knelt in front of Flux.   
"oh gods.. oh my god.. oh gods... oh my god..." she was gasping. Her eyes were squeezed shut and she had her arms around herself, rocking back and forth.   
"Hey..." Mouse reached out and touched her arm. There was no response. "Hey!" he said, louder, holding on to her shoulders. Her eyes snapped open, wide and scared. She was breathing hard.   
"I thought I was dead..." the girl whispered, staring at Mouse.  
"You're not... You're safe..." He shook her gently to emphasize his point. Tank moved behind them to unplug Neo and Trinity. Morpheus stood, watching. Flux wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. Her shoulders shook as she fought against tears.   
"So what was scaring the shit out of me supposed to make me learn?" She glared at Morpheus.   
"The Matrix is a system. That system is our enemy. But when you're inside, you look around. What do you see. Business men, teachers lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system, and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inert, so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it."  
"What the hell does that have to do with... That wasn't really the Matrix. That was another training program."  
Morpheus smiled.   
"Very good. A training program to teach you one thing. If you are not one of us, you are one of the enemies, the agents."  
"And all they do is try to wipe us out, one by one? What are they?"  
"Sentient programs. They can move in and out of any software still hard wired to their system. That means that anyone we haven't unplugged is potentially an agent. Inside the Matrix, they are everyone and they are no one. We have survived by hiding from them, by running from them. But they are the gatekeepers. They are guarding all the doors. The only person to ever successfully kill an Agent was Neo."  
As if on cue, Neo came to stand by her side opposite Trinity.   
"Part of the package deal that comes with being the One," he whispered to her. She nodded.   
"The agent's programming is constantly being updated and adapted. Techniques that worked against them three months ago will only get you killed now. We constantly have to be thinking faster than they can."  
"So this all goes back to the 'don't think, just act', huh?"   
"Exactly." Morpheus offered a hand to help her out of the chair. She took it, and got to her feet. Her knees buckled, and she grabbed Mouse's arm to stay upright.  
"Whoa!"  
"You okay?" Mouse asked.  
"Just a little unnerved still. It's not every day you have three damn guns leveled at your head." She glared at the back of Morpheus' head as he departed.   
"You want to sit down again?"  
"That sounds good, yeah." She plopped back down into the seat and rubbed her eyes again. "Sheesh."   
"Thinking too hard again, huh?" Neo asked. With a grin, Flux nodded.   
"Gotten better on the apologizing though, haven't I?"  
Neo returned her grin, and thumped her good naturedly on the back.  
"Yeah..."  
Tank poked Mouse in the arm.  
"Hey man, aren't you going to give her your usual routine?"  
Mouse looked at Tank blankly for a moment, the realized what he was talking about. Under his hat, his ears turned red.  
"Yeah, Mouse... you pulled it on Neo..." Trinity ribbed him.   
Without a word, Mouse stood up and left.   
"What was that about?" Flux asked. Neo looked at Trinity, who in turn looked at Tank.   
"Mouse programmed most of that training sim." Tank started to explain. "You saw the chick in red?"   
Flux nodded.  
"She was his pet project... okay, more like his obsession. He's tried to pimp her off on every male member of the crew at least once."   
"Honestly?" Flux asked, amused. Tank, Trinity and Neo all nodded. "That's hilarious! I know guys who'd kill to meet.... her...." An evil glint appeared in her eyes. "Oh, I just got the BEST idea. Tank, can you teach me how to use the keyboard?"   
  
  
When Mouse finally ventured out of his room again, being just a little less embarrassed, the first person he ran into was Flux, alone at the control panel and furiously tapping something out. He started a little as he looked at the screens... on one was his rotating view of the woman in red... on the next was a logo, a ripoff of the AOL symbol.... on the one directly in front of the girl there were several blocks of code that she was changing around to do something....   
"What are you doing?" he asked. She looked up.  
"Being the bitch most people know me as." An evil grin spread over her face. "No, actually... I'm making a video clip of the chick in red to send to this group of jerk-off guys I know inside the Matrix... It's her saying she saw them somewhere and wants to meet them... and they'll fall for it, hook, line and sinker, I'm sure. I'm gonna hack into one of the e-mail systems from out here and send it that way, so they have no clue who it came from. I hope you don't mind me using her... after you spent all that time on her program yourself."  
Mouse shrugged. "I don't care what you do to her. I just threw her in the training program to piss Morpheus off a little."  
"That's not what Tank said."  
There was a long pause before Mouse responded.  
"Okay, fine. She was... I don't know." He sat down on the nearest chair .  
"You cyber-ho?" Flux asked.  
"No, more like the only girl who'd ever look at me twice. And only because I programmed her to. Pathetic, huh?"   
"No more pathetic than the time I had everyone convinced I was dating someone in Seattle. Taylor Unsichtbar. His family was from Germany, four generations back. Unsichtbar... you know what it means?"   
Mouse shook his head, interested.  
"Taylor Invisible. I was dating Taylor Invisible. When people started getting suspicious I 'broke up' with him... and acted sufficiently depressed for the next two weeks. If nothing else, I learned how to act depressed really well."  
"At least I'm not the only one."   
"At least I'm not the only one either. Here's to the losers." She held out her hand and Mouse shook it. "Welcome to the club. What should I write in the message part of this? You're a guy, what would get your attention?"  
Mouse slid off the chair and stood beside her, leaning on the control chair and looking at the screens.   
"That's what I've got so far." Flux pointed to the monitor in front of her. "and these are the four losers I'm sending it to." she pointed at another monitor, showing pictures and short bios on the four boys. Mouse scanned them quickly.  
"Put in something to feed their egos... something about how manly they are... flatter them."   
Flux typed in another sentence.   
"Oh yeah, that's good... and how about where to meet her?"   
"Somewhere cold, wet, and impossible to get to... umm...." She typed in another sentence.   
"That's just mean!" Mouse protested, reading it.  
"These are the guys that threatened daily to tie me down and rape me... nothing's too good for them."  
"Rape you?" Mouse sounded surprised.  
"Yeah." Flux continued, talking as she typed. "I don't see why they'd want to choose me, I'd be a lot of work... there are plenty of bimbos who'd give them what they wanted without the struggle I'd put up."   
Mouse was silent. Flux hit one last key, then leaned back in the chair and smiled.   
"Revenge is sweet. I wish I could see the look on their faces as they realized it was all a joke. I know they'll be there at the meeting place tonight.. they check their e-mail like, 18 times a day... they're all wannabe hackers... it's entertaining."  
"Actually... I might be able to talk Tank into letting us go in, if we promise our asses off to stay out of trouble. Hold on." He scrambled down the ladder, in search of Tank.   
Five minutes later, Mouse reappeared, tank in tow, explaining the situation. They stopped just out of Flux's earshot. She couldn't tell what Tank was thinking.  
  
"C'mon, please, Tank." Mouse was begging. "She really wants to see what they do... it'll be funny."  
"She hasn't been into the Matrix once yet.. it's suicide for both of you if anyone makes a wrong step."  
"We'll be right next door to the line out. Nothing could go wrong."  
"Did you think anything was going to go wrong when we took Neo to see the Oracle?"   
Mouse flinched, one arm sub-consciously going across his stomach.  
"That was low," he hissed.   
"Neither of you are going in without permission from Morpheus or Neo or Trinity going with you."  
"Damn." There was no doubt in Mouse's mind that Morpheus, Neo and Trinity would not look on this kindly.   
"Sorry." Tank offered. "But it's for your own good."  
"Yeah, man, I know. Thanks anyway." He went back over and sat down in the chair nearest Flux. Tank followed him, shooing the girl out of his seat. She pouted, then climbed out, leaning on the arm and facing Mouse.   
"Tank ixnayed." Mouse told her  
"Awwww." She turned and pouted at Tank.  
"Hey, I don't want you two dead any more than anyone else...plus, Morpheus would have my head."  
"Shoot! That would have been good cheap entertainment too. Oh well." She sighed. "I'll have fun just imagining what they'll do."   
"If you were there, they'd scalp you." Tank said, running a hand backwards up her almost-bald head. "Of course, there's not much scalp to take."   
"Shut UP! I didn't ask to look like Sinead O'Connor." Flux smacked him on the arm.   
"No.. Sinead O'Connor pulled it off better." Tank taunted.  
"Okay.. I'm not talking to you anymore." She turned back around and folded her arms. "So Mouse... what now?"  
"Hey... it was a joke!" Tank protested.  
"Gee, do you hear something?"  
"No... I don't hear a thing." Mouse decided to play along.  
"Oh, come on... not both of you!'  
Flux turned around. "Oh, my!" she pretended to be making a wonderful discovery. "Look at this! I wonder what it is?" She looked behind Tank's ear.   
"Okay.. cut it out." he protested.  
"I think it's trying to communicate!"  
"Yeah, trying... it's not doing too well." Mouse commented.   
"All right...!" Tank grabbed Flux around the waist, dragging her into his lap where he tickled her. She shrieked and squirmed away, laughing. Mouse was in stitches, sitting on his chair.   
"What are you laughing at?" Flux sat down next to him and gave him a good smack on the arm.   
"Hey.... you got yourself into that one."  
"So?" She smacked him again.  
"Quit it!" He grabbed her wrists and held her down until Morpheus' head appeared from the ladder-well.   
"Is everything all right here?" the leader asked. Tank looked at Mouse and Flux. All three nodded in unison.  
"Tank... Mouse, can I have a word with you?"  
Mouse shrugged, looking at Tank.  
"Yeah.. sure." Mouse let go of Flux's wrists and the two followed Morpheus.   
Alone, Flux sighed and climbed back into Tank's chair... looking for something fun to do.  
  
Morpheus led Tank and Mouse into the mess hall. Trinity and Neo were already there, talking quietly. They looked up as the three came in. Morpheus gestured for Mouse and Tank to sit, then sat in between Neo and Trinity.  
"It's time to take Flux in to see the Oracle. I want everyone to go."  
Mouse flinched. Trinity put a hand on his shoulder.  
"This time, " Morpheus continued, nodding to Mouse. "we take everybody. I don't care how crowded we get, the safety of all crew members is more important than comfort."   
There was a unanimous nodding of heads from the gathered crew. Mouse let out a quiet sigh of relief. He tried not to show it, but the memory of the Agents bursting in... his rather futile attempts to hold them off... still made his skin crawl. He remembered the feeling of the metal shells puncturing his skin, shooting through flesh to lodge somewhere deep inside. Puddles of blood, congealing on the floor around him where he lay. He shuddered. Trinity looked over at him, concerned.  
"Mouse.. you okay?"  
Mouse shook his head, barely. "Uh..uh." He was shivering. Trinity got up and came around to his side of the table, turning him around and kneeling in front of him.  
"Mouse, why don't you come with me." She helped him off the bench and led him out of the room.   
  
Flux looked up as they came in.   
"Hi... what's wrong?" She jumped down from the chair she had been sitting in, sketching something on a scrap of paper.  
"Things kind of.. took a turn for the worse." Trinity sat Mouse down on the chair Flux had just vacated and knelt in front of him. "Hey Mouse, I'm going to go join the rest of the gang, but Flux is here, okay?" There was a weak nod from Mouse. Trinity took Flux by the arm and pulled her aside quickly.   
"It's a sort of flashback to when he was shot by the Agents... just keep an eye on him-he should be fine."  
Flux nodded, glancing back at the boy. Trinity left to go back and join the others again. Flux sat down next to Mouse and put an arm around his shoulders. He was still shivering.   
"It's just the day for nervous breakdowns, isn't it?" Flux muttered half to herself, remembering her own panic attack after coming out of the simulation earlier.   
"I'm sorry." Mouse croaked out.  
"It's okay." She squeezed his shoulder gently. "It's not your fault. Just don't get into the habit of apologizing too much... I do that enough for both of us."  
Mouse managed a small smile, still looking at the floor. His knuckles were becoming gradually less white and his hands weren't clenched quite as tightly anymore. "Neo told you that."  
"Yeah. He's not exactly the king of subtlety."   
Mouse's smile grew a little bit more. He consciously unclenched his hands the rest of the way and rubbed them on his thighs. He didn't really want to move away from the girl. She was...comforting... in some way.   
"Doing better?" she asked.  
"A little."  
"Good."  
  
  
Trinity came back in in the middle of Morpheus' sentence.  
"...amply armed and aware. Everybody watching everyone else's back at all times." He paused as Trinity took her seat again. "How's he doing?"  
"Getting better, I think. I left him with Flux... she's keeping an eye on him," she answered. Tank and Neo exchanged a look.   
"How is the girl doing?" Morpheus asked, looking around the table.   
"She's doing pretty well... she couldn't sleep last night, but after she came out and talked to me for a little, she was fine." Neo offered.  
"I taught her how to use the keyboards-she figured out how to code in no time flat." Tank reported. "I like her. She's kind of like the younger sister I never had."  
Trinity smiled. "It's nice to have another teenager around. I think she adds a certain amount of life to the ship."  
Neo nodded, "It's kind of like having an extended family onboard now-little sister and all."  
"Then we have no danger of having another.... informant?" Morpheus glanced around the table again. Tank, Trinity and Neo were all shaking their heads. "Good. We'll go in at sixteen hundred hours." Morpheus stood up, adjourning the impromptu meeting. Tank was out the door first, followed by Trinity and Neo conversing between themselves quietly. Abruptly, Tank stopped.   
"Neo...look." he pointed at Flux and Mouse, heads together, laughing quietly about something, her arm around his shoulders. From Neo's grin Trinity put three and one together.   
"You guys... I don't believe you two." She shook her head. "From the digital pimp to the matchmakers. I swear you two are as bad as a couple of old ladies."   
One of the monitors in the control panel switched the Matrix viewer off. An icon blinked in the corner. Trinity headed for it, but Tank brushed by her and got there first. Flux and Mouse looked up. Trinity stood behind Tank.   
"It's a data shift. The Sentinels captured another ship." Tank reported.  
"Which one?" Trinity reached over Tank's shoulder and typed in the search command.   
Neo, Mouse and Flux gathered in front of the screens.   
"It's the Babylon... they captured the Babylon." Tank whispered. "The first one of us out." The crew list came up. "Protosym, Atlantis, Lilith, Chip, Thistle, Atom, Eon and Imp," he whispered.   
"What happened?" Flux whispered to Trinity.  
"Another ship was captured. The first one out from Zion. The Sentinels... the machines' equivalent to the Agents, are integrating the computer banks into their system. They're shifting data around, which we picked up." she explained.   
"So there are things that come after us out here too?"   
"Everywhere. Nowhere is really safe anymore." She saw the concerned look on the girl's face. "Don't worry. We have a weapon against them the Babylon didn't. This is one of the safest ships."  
Flux sighed and nodded, feeling only a little bit better. One by one, the crew left, scattering around the ship and leaving Tank alone to gather the grim news.  
  
%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%  
  
Without knowing it, Flux had fallen asleep sitting at the table in the mess hall. Her pencil, found under her mattress was still in one hand and her head was propped up with the other. She had her legs crossed and tucked under the table. She was blissfully unaware of the preparations going on up on the main deck for the group's trip to take her to see the Oracle. She had found her scrounged paper and pencil and headed for a place other people weren't, trying to get her mind off the news of the Babylon's capture. Even with Trinity's reassurances that the Nebuchadnezzar was one of the safest ships, she was still a little scared.  
Tank stuck his head in. looking for her.   
"There you are! Come on, girl!"  
Asleep, she didn't respond.  
"Hey, Flux... Shake a leg!" He came in and jostled her gently. She yelped and looked up at him.  
"Oh... you." She rubbed her eyes.   
"Yeah, me. They're almost ready to go in up there. It's about time you made your big entrance."  
"Okay..." she yawned. "...okay. I'll be right up."  
  
Morpheus met her as she came up to the main deck.  
"We're almost ready to take you in to see the Oracle."  
"Oracle? Like the Greek fortune teller?"  
"She doesn't so much tell fortunes as help you choose your future, if you will."  
"And she's human?"   
"Yes, very much so." Morpheus put a hand on the girl's shoulder and steered her towards one of the chairs. "She's extremely old. She's been with us since the beginning of the Resistance. She was the one who told me I would find Neo."  
"So she knows everything? Is she ever wrong?"  
"Try not to think of it in terms of right and wrong. She is a guide. She can help you to find the path for your future." Morpheus helped the girl into her chair and then walked behind her to get into his own. Tank secured the foot restraints over her boots and then took the connector needle down from the holder over the girl's head.   
"See you on the other side." Mouse said, grinning from the chair next to hers. Tank pushed the needle into her head.   
  
Blackness.   
  
The old hotel again. Sunlight streaming in through the heavy ripped curtains. The dark man was the first one in this time. He looked from side to side as the others appeared around him- the dark hared woman straightening her sunglasses, the other man, long coat fluttering in an almost-dead breeze, the boy, looking around nervously, and then, a new one-a girl, short, curly hair, a stripe in the front dyed bright purple. She blinked and looked around her, then looked down at herself.   
  
Trinity stepped up to the phone in the middle of the room and lifted the receiver.   
"We're through."  
*Have fun* Tank told her. She grinned and hung the phone up again, nodding to Morpheus.   
"Very good."   
Neo opened the doors, holding them as the others headed out. They opened onto a sort of porch-like area, a loading zone. There was an old-looking big black car parked a little ways away. Morpheus headed for it. Flux looked behind her. Neo was coming out of the doorway. He grinned.   
"It's okay. The first time in is always a little weird."  
"More than a little weird.... Where's Mouse?" she looked around. "I didn't see him come out."  
"I don't know." Neo opened the door again. Flux looked in. Mouse was standing on the stair landing above, gripping the banister with both hands.  
"Mouse... come on!" she called. He shook his head.  
"I can't do this."   
Flux looked back at Neo.   
"Tell Morpheus to wait for a minute."   
Neo nodded and let the door swing shut. Flux started up the stairs.   
"Mouse, I'm coming up, okay?" There was no answer. She reached the landing he was on and leaned on the banister next to him. "You all right?"  
"This... here.... is where the... the Agents..." he dropped his head and closed his eyes. "The only reason I made it last time- when we came to get you- was because Morpheus was there... and I wasn't going to let myself break down in front of him."   
She put her hand over his. "Where?"  
"Eighth floor... Second room."  
"Do you want to go up there?"  
He didn't respond.  
"You don't have to, but it might help."  
"Okay." Mouse whispered, nodding. "I'll go." He let go of the banister and took Flux's hand. They started up the stairs. As they got to the landing on the eighth floor, Mouse started to shiver. Flux put her hand on his back.   
"You don't have to."  
"Yes, I do." He took a breath and opened the second door. Eyes closed, he stepped inside. He was almost crushing Flux's hand, but she stayed silent.   
"Here." Mouse pushed aside the drapery over what seemed to be a window, revealing a brick wall. There were bullet holes through the bricks and red stains smeared down the walls and the floor. Mouse put both hands on the wall and bowed his head.   
"God... I thought I was dead." he whispered, dropping to his knees. "I thought I was dead." A single tear dripped from his eye. Flux knelt and embraced him. He turned around and put his arms around her waist, sobbing quietly into her shoulder.   
  
They stayed that way for a good five minutes before Mouse sighed and sat back, wiping at his eyes.   
"I don't know why this affects me so much."  
"You almost died. You're entitled to it."  
"I guess so."  
"Do you feel any better?"  
"Actually... yeah, I do. Thanks... a lot."  
Flux smiled, a little embarrassed.  
"No problem." She stood and helped Mouse to his feet. "Should we go down and join everyone else?"   
"I guess so." He took her hand and they went down the stairs together. Flux squinted against the sunlight as Mouse opened the door.  
"It's bright out here."  
"No, it's just dark in there."   
Flux looked up at him. He grinned. The car that had been out in front of the building was running. Neo stood up from where he had been sitting in the open door, gesturing for them to get in.   
  
  
Even though the car looked like it should have had room and then some to spare, it was crowded with five people in it. Trinity was driving, and Morpheus sat shotgun. Neo was in the back with Flux and Mouse. Flux watched the outside world go by through the windows.  
"Hey." She pointed to something outside. "That was my favorite CD store. It wasn't even real, was it. I just thought it was. All of the stuff I though I had done, the memories I've got...none of it's real."  
"The Matrix can do a lot of things," Neo explained. " but it can't tell you who you are. You have to decide that yourself."   
The car pulled up outside a shabby apartment building.  
"Come, Flux." Morpheus got out of the car and took the girl inside the building.  
"I hope the Oracle's easier on her than she was on me." Neo muttered.   
  
Inside the building, Morpheus pushed the elevator up button and then ushered the girl inside. They rode to the third floor in silence. Morpheus got off first and led the girl to a door. Room 303. It looked the same as any of the other doors lining the hall.  
"I can only show you the door, Flux. You have to open it."   
Flux looked at him for a moment, then reached out towards the doorknob. Before she touched it, the door swung open. The kind face of one of the Oracle's 'priestesses' greeted her.   
"Hello, Flux. You're right on time. Morpheus, make yourself at home. Flux, come with me."   
Flux followed her into the living room of the apartment.  
"You can wait here, with the other potentials." The priestess moved off, down the hall. Morpheus was nowhere to be seen. There were others in the room, her age or younger-a young bald boy in a toga-like garment was sitting on the floor behind a row of mangled spoons. Two girls were juggling blocks in the air, never once touching them. The boy in the corner who looked to be the closest to her age looked up from the book he was reading to glance at her. He looked from her head to her feet and back again. Flux smiled at him, but there was something condescending in his eyes that she didn't like. He returned to his book. Another of the priestesses touched her on the shoulder.   
"The Oracle will see you now." She was pointed towards the kitchen. Looking up at the beaded doorway hanging, she went in.  
  
There was a plump African American woman sitting at the kitchen table wearing half-glasses and squinting at a needlepoint frame on the table in front of her. She looked up as the girl came in.   
"Flux. Welcome."  
"You're the Oracle?"  
The Oracle smiled.  
"Not what you expected, huh?"   
"I don't know. I didn't know what to expect."  
"Smart girl. You were expecting one of those Greeks draped in a bedsheet and sitting in a marble chair though, weren't you."   
"Well.... kind of." Flux looked down, somewhat embarrassed. The Oracle chuckled.   
"Girl, that's one of the more flattering things I've been imagined as. I'll take it as a compliment. Now then, you have no clue why you're here, don't you."   
"Morpheus said you saw the future-you were a guide, and helped people choose the way to go."  
"Morpheus was right." She put a few more stitches into the needlepoint. "You have a thing for that Mouse boy, don't you."  
"Well..." Flux stalled.  
"Don't hide it, girl, I can read you like an open book."  
Flux turned red and looked at her boots.  
"There's nothing wrong with it. Just be careful. He'll be there when your life takes a turn. Can't see if it's for better or worse, though, and if it's for worse, there's no telling what he'll do. You kept him sane today... he knows it, and he's ready to do the same for you."   
Flux's face was fire-engine red, and if she stared any harder at the floor, it was going to start smoking.   
"Hey, girl." The Oracle got up and put an arm around Flux's shoulders. "Don't be embarrassed. I see you doing great things. Great things, girl. You're gonna get out there and do what even Neo hasn't attempted."   
"Neo's done-"  
"-a darn lot, I know. But what you're gonna do he's never even thought of trying."  
"Is that good or bad?"  
"I don't know, honey. I honestly don't know." The Oracle gave her a squeeze, then went over to a cow shaped cookie jar. "Take a snickerdoodle. You'll feel better when you get outside, trust me."   
Flux took the cookie, and turned to go.   
"Keep your chin up, Flux." the Oracle called after her. "Always look to the light." Flux smiled. The beaded curtain in the kitchen door clicked as she exited. The Oracle smiled and shook her head, returning to her needlepoint.   
  
Morpheus met Flux as she came out of the kitchen. Sensing she was about to speak, he stopped her.   
"The Oracle's words are for you and you alone."  
Flux shrugged and bit into the cookie. She slowly finished the cookie in the elevator ride down. It was dark outside, and streetlight reflections shone in the paint of the shiny black car. Flux slid into the backseat next to Mouse again. Neo had moved up to shotgun to talk to Trinity; he got out and moved into the back, relinquishing the seat to Morpheus.   
"What time is it?" Flux asked. Trinity looked at the dashboard clock.   
"7:07."  
"Hey... Millennium's open," Mouse commented.  
"He's right... anyone for clubbing?" Neo looked around.  
"Uh.. slight problem." Flux waved her hand. "Unless you guys have a lot of pull, you're not gonna get me in. I'm still only fourteen."   
Neo pulled something out of his pocket and handed it to her.   
"You're not fourteen. You've been eighteen for the last month."  
It was a laminated ID card, dated a month ago, with her picture and date of birth... 1982.  
"Oh... awesome!"  
"You and Mouse both have one. We've changed your birth certificates and records temporarily too. You'll stay 'eighteen' until you actually have your eighteenth birthday, and then you'll start aging again. It's so you can get into places with us or without us if something weird happens." Neo explained.  
"Of course, it also comes awfully in handy when you get carded at clubs." Mouse whispered to her.   
  
Trinity pulled the car into a gravel parking lot behind a row of low brick buildings. Flux pulled at the door handle, trying to figure out how it opened. Mouse leaned across and opened it for her.   
"Ohh.... I get it." It was a suicide door.... no wonder she had been having problems. She slid out and straightened her jacket. It kept getting hung up on the velvet of the shirt she was wearing. Mouse stood up behind her and closed the car door. Neo crunched over the gravel towards the low silver dome on the other side of the lot.   
  
The line to get into Millennium was short, and the group reached the front almost immediately. The bouncer waved Trinity, Morpheus and Mouse through and then paused, looking at Flux.   
"You don't look-"  
Flux cut him off, holding up her ID card between two fingers. At the same time, Neo moved closer behind her, making it more than obvious that they were part of the same group. The bouncer took the card from her and looked at it, glancing from the picture to her face and back again. Flux gave him her best impatient look. The bouncer turned around and tapped another man on the shoulder, showing him the card. They exchanged brief words, and the other man nodded.   
"Okay, go on." The first bouncer sounded less then happy with his counterpart's decision.   
"Thank you." Flux took her card back rather sharply, and with Neo headed inside.   
  
The air was hazy... partially with cigarette smoke and partially from the dry-ice fog they were pumping in for 'atmosphere'. Flux paused for a moment, letting her eyes adjust to the semi-darkness. Neo took her elbow and steered her towards the other side of the dome where Trinity and Mouse had commandeered one of the low tables. Morpheus was nowhere to be seen.   
"Pretty cool, huh?" Mouse said into her ear. She turned, grinning.   
"Yeah... pretty darn cool."  
There were lasers and strobe lights and stage lights in all colors suspended from the top of the dome, the lasers cutting through the smoke to project colored squiggles on the walls. The stage-type lights pointed in all different directions, flooding different sections of the dome with all colors of the rainbow. The music pounded from hundreds of different speakers, surrounding you in an envelope of noise and making it hard to communicate.   
"Both of you okay?" Trinity asked. Flux and Mouse both nodded. "No alcohol, remember. There's only so far I'll push the laws. Oh... Flux." She dug into her pocket and pulled something out. Taking the girl's hand she dropped a small green crystal on a chain into her palm. "It's a tracking device-so Tank can tell where you are. The transmission signals fluctuate so the Agents can't use it to find you." She smiled. "Everyone wears them differently, but I thought this might be the easiest for you." She and Neo moved into the crowd, heading for the bar. Flux sat on the carpeted tabletop and shrugged her jacket off, hooking the crystal around her neck.   
"My parents would so kill me if they could see me now."   
"The thing is that they're genetically not really your parents." Mouse pulled the chair at the back of the table out and sat down, putting his feet up next to Flux and taking his sunglasses off.   
"What do you mean?" she scootched around to face him.  
"I mean that the people you thought you were living with aren't really your parents. Everyone's born in a test tube now, and the machines just make the couples think that it's their kid. You could actually be the offspring of some Eskimo and an Australian. That's why these days, a lot of kids don't look a darn thing like their parents."  
"That kinda makes sense... I didn't look like either of my 'parents'." She made quotation marks in the air with her fingers. "Of course, it made it easy for them. They could just claim I wasn't theirs when I got into trouble."  
"Which you did a lot."  
"Which I did a lot, yeah." She chuckled and swung her legs over the other edge of the table so she was sitting face to face with Mouse. The song changed, transitioning into a jazzed-up and synthesized version of Britney Spears' "Baby One More Time.' Flux made a gagging noise.  
"Even technology can't help this song. Or Britney herself. 'Hit me baby one more time'" she warbled in a mocking falsetto. "Blonde silicone enhanced bimbo... your type of girl, Mouse."   
Mouse glared good-naturedly at her.   
"That wasn't funny."   
"Oh, yes it was."   
"How do you know what type of girl I like?" He leaned forward.  
"The Pamela Anderson clone you programmed kind of gave it away."  
"Maybe that's just one type. How do you know I don't think short girls wearing black with partially purple hair are hot?"   
Flux grinned, twisting the purple stripe in her hair around her finger.   
"Are you calling me short?" she asked.   
"Are you saying I like Britney Spears?" he countered.  
"No."   
"Then I'm not calling you short."  
Flux crossed her legs and propped her heels on the arm of Mouse's chair, remembering what the Oracle had said about him. She cocked her head to the side and looked at him.   
"What's wrong?" he asked.   
She shook her head. "Just thinking."  
"Something the Oracle said?"   
"Yeah." she rubbed the side of her nose. "It's no big deal."   
In a techno riff, Britney Spears disappeared into Eiffel65.  
"Oh gods, I love this song." Flux started singing along. "-that lives in a blue world and all day and all night and everything he sees is just blue like him inside and outside." Flux stood up and pulled Mouse to his feet, dragging him out onto the dance floor.   
"Oh, come on...." he protested.  
"Don't give me any crap about not being able to dance."  
"Well, I can't!"   
"Then you'll just have to learn." She grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him in close to her, putting one arm around his neck. "Just move. Don't think."   
  
Mouse found out quickly that he could dance, and in fact rather liked it.   
  
The song ended, morphing into an even more popped-up version of Right Said Fred's 'I'm Too Sexy.' Flux immediately started mouthing the words, making Mouse laugh. She started to giggle, and then it was all they could do to make it back to the table before collapsing. Flux put her head down on the table and tried to catch her breath.   
"Whooo..." Mouse breathed.  
"And you said you couldn't dance." Flux looked up at him from the tabletop.   
"Maybe I lied."   
"Maybe you shouldn't lie. It could get you in trouble."  
"Ooh..." Mouse raised an eyebrow at her.  
"Sicko." She swatted at him, putting her head back down on the table. He caught her wrist and pulled her up.   
"I... uh... never got to... thank you for what happened earlier.... so I guess... thank you." He leaned forward and kissed her gently on the lips, then pulled back, watching for her reaction.   
"Well then.... you're welcome." She kissed him back, then smiled. "Would you believe I've never kissed a guy before?"  
"If you'd believe I've never kissed a girl before." He smiled back, and put an arm around her, letting her rest her head on his shoulder.   
"Here's to the blind leading the blind," she joked.  
"Hip-hip-hooray." Mouse gave a quiet cheer, and they both laughed.   
  
Tank, watching onboard the Neb, gave a whoop. "AwRIGHT!"  
  
Trinity and Neo came back to find Flux and Mouse around 10:00. Flux was half asleep, tired from her training that morning and then the excitement of meeting the Oracle, and was dozing on Mouse's shoulder.   
"Time to go, you guys. There may be trouble coming in." Neo said. Mouse nodded, and nudged Flux.   
"Wake up... time to go."   
"Mmmpph.." she complained, and opened her eyes. "I heard him." She pushed herself up out of the chair and put her coat on, following Neo and Trinity out the back door. The car was waiting, in the rain, Morpheus in the driver's seat. She slid into the back seat after Mouse and shook her damp hair out of her eyes, pulling the door shut. Morpheus stepped on the gas and the tires ground on the loose gravel as the car turned and sped away.  
"What kind of trouble?" Flux asked.  
"Tank said there were three agents getting too close for comfort." Neo explained. "We decided it was better to be safe than sorry."   
"Which is usually a good policy." Trinity added. She twisted the knob on the car radio, and it sputtered to life, playing the GooGoo Doll's 'Iris'  
"Ooh... good song." Flux put her head back on Mouse's shoulder and closed her eyes.   
  
The ride back to the old abandoned hotel was uneventful at best.Flux was jostled awake again as they pulled into the loading zone. Morpheus killed the engine and everyone climbed out, squinting against the rain. Inside, Flux shook her jacket off, leaving a series of small puddles in the entryway. As the group climbed the stairs to get to the hard-line on the second floor, Mouse looked up to the eighth floor then took Flux's hand. She looked up briefly too, then squeezed his hand gently.   
Morpheus pushed the double door open, holding it for the rest of the group. Almost on cue, the old-fashioned phone rang. Neo lifted it to his ear. He was covered in.. no... he became a wireframe image, then disappeared from the bottom up. Trinity hung the phone up again. It rang immediately. She picked it up again, and offered it to Flux. The girl took it and put it to her ear, watching Trinity. The room became a wireframe model for a split second, and then there was blackness.   
  
Her eyes opened. She was back on the Nebuchadnezzar, and Tank was *hello!* taking the spike out of the back of her skull. He leaned over and spoke into her ear.  
"So you chose Mouse over me, huh? I'm hurt."   
"You little..... aagh!" she smacked him on the shoulder. He grinned and thumped her on the back.  
"No.. hey. I'm happy for ya, Little Sister."   
She smiled, a little embarrassed. Neo was grinning from the other side of the room, unhooking Trinity. Tank caught the girl up in a big bear hug, and she laughed.   
"All right... thank you, Tank!" Climbing down from the chair, she yawned and headed down to the lower deck and her room.   
  
**&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&&&&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&*&  
  
In the middle of the night all of the lights on the Neb went off abruptly. Buzzer alarms kicked in, and the backup battery switched on with a whir. Half asleep, Flux opened one eye, and then the other. Her room was pitch-black. Slowly, she stood up and felt her way to the door. The backup light panel flickered to life and she grabbed the door. Opening it, she stuck her head out into the hall. Trinity was coming towards her, a less than happy look on her face. She looked the other way. Morpheus was coming out of the room at the end of the hall to meet Trinity. They exchanged a few words. Trinity was shaking her head, and Morpheus didn't look happy.   
"What's going on?" Mouse came up behind her.  
"I don't know. I don't think it's good though..."  
Tank came part way down the ladder behind Morpheus and said something to Trinity. Trinity was obviously not expecting it. She turned and started back down the hall, Morpheus on her heels.   
"Trinity...Morpheus... what's going on?" Flux asked.  
Trinity shook her head. "The power routed to the hover-coils just died, taking the rest of the power grid down with it. I don't know why."  
"What did Tank say?"  
"We have three squiddies looking for breakfast." Morpheus said as he went up the ladder at the other end of the hall.   
"Squiddies?" Flux asked.  
"Sentinels." Trinity looked after Morpheus, then back to Flux and Mouse. "You guys stay down here... try not to move too much or make any noise... they can pick up on it."   
"IS the EMP still online?" Mouse asked.   
Trinity shrugged. " I don't know. I hope so." She followed Morpheus up the ladder.   
"I thought she said this was one of the safest ships." Flux muttered.  
"We're fine unless the EMP is dead."   
"EMP?"   
"Electro-magnetic pulse. Disables any electrical system in the blast area. Including ours, if Tank didn't re-wire."  
"Oh, so we're gonna fry ourselves if we try to retaliate? That seems like a wonderful way to fight." She turned and walked back into her room, less than happy. She flopped down on the bed again, and put an arm over her eyes.   
Mouse leaned in the doorway. "I think Tank fixed it. We're free and clear."   
"That's not what you just said." She sat up and glared at him.   
"So I lied."  
"What did I tell you about lying?"  
Mouse smiled, coming in and sitting on the bed beside her. She rubbed her eyes.   
"I have that stupid song stuck in my head. 'da ba dee da ba da'. I'm gonna be singing that for the next week. Ugh. Kill me now, please."  
"That could be arranged-" There was a clang from above them. They both looked towards the noise.   
"Maybe we should shut up." Flux suggested. Mouse nodded. The emergency light flipped off, leaving them in darkness.  
"I bet they took the emergency generator for the EMP." Tank whispered from somewhere beside Flux.  
The ship shuddered once, then fell silent. There were a series of quiet scratching noises somewhere on the hull. They were moving..... and got progressively louder. Whatever it was was getting closer to the room. There was another moment of absolute deathly silence.   
WHAM! Something huge and magnetic attached to the hull, directly outside Flux's room. She screamed and scrambled backwards, right into Mouse. He put his arms around her and she buried her face in his shoulder, her heart in her mouth.   
"imgonnadieimgonnadieimgonnadieimgonnadie" she whispered. Somehow she knew the thing was looking for her. The EMP shrieked, and the ship shook.   
  
Inside the Matrix the new lead Agent, Agent Johnson smiled. The Sentinel-the new searcher breed-had transmitted enough information before its death to give them a new target-The Nebuchadnezzar. Two distinct heartbeat signatures had been recognized, that of one Thomas Anderson, known as Neo, and that of one Teka Langden, known as Flux. One of them was sure to crack and give them the location of Zion - the girl most likely, because of her age and inexperience. Once they had secured the city, they could begin the cleansing. Agent Johnson smiled grimly. This would be a good hunt.  
  
The thing on the side of the ship disconnected with a thunk. The lights flickered back on. Flux didn't move, her eyes squeezed shut. She was shivering. There were footsteps down the hall, and Tank came in the door.   
"You guys okay?"   
Flux shook her head.   
"What was it?" Mouse asked him.  
"I don't know... they were squiddies of some sort, but they didn't have as many arms."   
"They? There was more than one of them?" Flux looked at him.  
"Yeah.. there was one here and one up over Neo and Trinity in the cockpit."   
"Neo.... they were after me and Neo."   
"What?" Mouse was confused.  
"How do you know that?" Tank asked.  
Flux shook her head. "I don't know.... I just do."   
Tank glanced at Mouse, then back at Flux.  
"Okay." he sighed. "We got the power grid up again, but I think it's only temporarily. I guess since everyone's up we're gonna start working on that now." He stood. "Better get up there before they come down here looking."   
Flux untangled herself from Mouse and they followed Tank up to the main deck. Trinity had her head inside a panel on the wall and was pulling fried wires out and handing them to Neo.   
"Neo, what do we need done?" Tank asked.   
"We're gonna have to find replacements for these," he held up the handful of charred wires.   
"There's a whole mess of loose wires down in the mess hall." Mouse said. Neo and Tank both looked at him.  
"Go get 'em." Tank told him. Mouse headed back down the ladder, and five minutes later, came back triumphant with a bundle of loose wires in all different lengths.   
"Those are awfully short." Tank look skeptically at the bundle.  
"These are also awfully the only ones I know of." Mouse replied. Tank thought it over.   
"Take Flux and you two go look for more. If you can't find 'em, come back and you can both start soldering the really short ones together."  
"I honestly don't think there are any more." Mouse protested  
"Just go look. There were a whole bunch of long wires in the storage hold for a while."   
"In the storage hold?" Mouse considered that for a moment. "Okay... fine." Flux followed him back down the ladder. Instead of going down the hall back towards the mess hall and the rest of the rooms, he ducked through the small hatch behind the ladder.  
"Just a question... but do you know where you're going?" Flux called after him.  
"Yeah... the storage hold's almost underneath the mess hall. This is the only way to get there." He paused and waited for her.   
"So this is just random stuff in storage?" she asked.  
"It's all the stuff we knew we ought to keep that there wasn't any room for anywhere else. Watch your head, the ceiling gets low in here."   
Flux ducked, looking around. They must be going into the absolute bottom of the ship. Wires snaked around down here even worse than they did up above. She voiced this opinion and Mouse laughed.  
"I know... if you thought it was bad up there you haven't seen anything until you get down here. We're gonna have to get down and crawl the rest of the way."   
"Oh goody." She followed him into the tube-like hallway. "It's like Star Trek... a Jeffrey's Tube."  
"Not quite as high-tech though." He went around a curve.   
"Not quite as climate controlled either. It's freezing down here." The tube ended in a half-circle up ahead. Mouse paused and reached up, pulling a chain hanging there. The end of the tube lit up.   
"To shed a little light on the subject." He jumped down into the storage hold, then helped Flux down. The storage hold turned out to be a long low room piled with random pieces of technology occasionally interspersed with a totally random piece of something else. Flux picked up a brown leather bomber helmet and tried it on.   
"What do you think... is it me?"   
"Oh yeah... it's you."   
She laughed and waded into the junk.   
"So we're just looking for any wires we can find?"  
"I guess so. Tank didn't specify at all."  
"Okay." She pulled at what looked like the middle of a wire. The junk on top of each end shifted and she pulled out a red rubber ball attached to a wooden paddle by an elastic cord. "Oh hey! You know how impossible these things are?" She started trying to hit the rubber ball with the paddle. A minute later she had hit it only once.   
"Darn it to heck. I give up." She tossed it into a half empty box. "How deep are these wires supposed to be buried?"  
Mouse shrugged. "I have no clue. I don't think they even exist and Tank's sent us on a search for nothing."  
"Then we find a whole bunch of nothing and go back and tell Tank that." Flux waded further into the stuff. "How about that corner? It looks hopeful." She started towards it, pushing stuff out of her way as she went.  
Five minutes went by, then ten, then fifteen, and they didn't find a thing.   
"I give up." Mouse sighed.  
"Yeah, me too." Flux turned around. Mouse had disappeared. "Mouse?"   
"Yeah?"  
"Where the heck are you?"  
A hand waved over a stack of stuff.   
"What are you doing back there?"  
"Giving up."  
Flux cleared a path to the pile of stuff and looked over it. Mouse was sitting on an old beanbag chair, holding a pair of pliers.   
"Come down here often?" she asked.  
He chuckled. "Only when Morpheus wants something done." He scooted over, making more room on the beanbag chair. Flux sat down beside him.  
"It's actually kind of nice down here... or it would be if it weren't so damn cold."  
Mouse reached behind her and pulled the blanket that had been wadded up behind the beanbag over her shoulders.   
"Morpheus must want a lot done." she observed wryly. "You have everything but your own food supply down here."  
"Yeah, but how much of that glop could you stand to eat in a day?" Mouse asked.   
"Good point.... You know what food I miss?" She leaned back into the beanbag.  
"What?"  
"Chocolate. I want a big 'ol Three Musketeers bar." She sighed. "Guess that's not gonna happen again though."  
Mouse slid down into the beanbag so their heads were together.   
"You know what I miss? Stringy cheesy pizza that's so hot all of the toppings slide off when you bite into it."  
"Or Ring Pops. I was addicted to raspberry Ring Pops. I always had blue lips."  
"Cheeseburgers with greasy French fries."  
"Corn dogs."  
"Tacos."  
"Even school cafeteria food sounds good now." Flux moaned. "It's not until you can't have it you realize how good it really was."   
"You haven't even been out that long." Mouse reminded her. She sighed.   
"Long enough. Everything from my life before seems like a weird dream."   
"Either that or this life is just a weird dream."  
"Yeah. Do you ever wonder what the people you knew did when you just disappeared off the face of the earth?"  
"Off the face of the Matrix, you mean? I don't think I was close enough to anybody for anyone to really notice."  
"I know what you mean, man. I know what you mean. I think there's only one person at school that would have noticed I wasn't there for more than one day in a row."  
"My 'parents' probably just figured I ran away or something. I threatened it enough." Mouse shrugged. "I hated them so much. My mom divorced my dad when I was three and then remarried this guy who hated my guts but loved my little sister and brother because they were actually his kids. Every time I came out of my room he'd yell at me for some totally bogus reason. That was why I started hacking to begin with... so I'd have an excuse to stay in my room for infinite amounts of time. "  
"I got started when I figured out how to get on the internet at school without a password. One of the guys in my class who saw me do it said he'd give me twenty bucks if I could get into the school computer system and change his grades. I didn't want the money, but I did it just to see if I could. From there, I started trying to get into bigger and bigger things, just for the heck of it, and changing little things just so they'd know someone had gotten in there."  
"Can I have part of the blanket?" Mouse asked.   
"Yeah... here." Flux untucked it from around her shoulders and handed a corner to him. She sighed again. "It's so hard to realize that the Matrix is just a really good VR program."  
"But you always have to remember that even when you're in the Matrix, you can get hurt or killed out here. It's kind of a big game of seeing how many rules of the Matrix you can bend. Or a big mind game-seeing how much you can believe is actually physically there or if you're brain's just making you believe it's real."  
Flux looked at him. "So was that kiss real or was my mind making it up?"  
Mouse looked back at her. "Do you want to find out?"   
She nodded. He leaned towards her and their lips touched briefly. Flux put her arms around his neck and kissed him back.  
"So what do you think?" he asked.  
"It was real." She grinned. "You're awesome, Mouse."  
He smiled back at her. "I still want that cheese pizza."   
"I still want my blue-raspberry Ring-Pop and my Three Musketeers bar." She put one hand under her head and looked up at the ceiling.   
The lights flicked off and then after a moment, on again.   
"Hey, you find those wires yet?" Tank called.  
Flux and Mouse looked at each other. Mouse shook his head.   
"We're not here." he whispered, and pulled the blanket over their heads so they were covered. "Don't move."  
There was a clang as Tank jumped down from the opening in the wall to the ground.   
"I know you're down here somewhere.... Come on..... Flux.... Mouse....." He was getting closer.  
Flux had one hand over her mouth, trying not to laugh. Mouse grabbed her wrist.  
"Don't you dare," he whispered. She shook her head, and put her face into the beanbag.   
"Come on...." Tank called. "It's cold down here." Mouse lifted a corner of the blanket and peeked out. The beanbag creaked.   
"Shit!" he hissed, and dropped the blanket. Tank turned in the direction of the noise. Flux smacked Mouse gently. She could see Tank's boots from under their cover as he stood in front of them.   
"Ah HA!" Tank lifted a corner and peered under. Flux cat-hissed, frightening him, and he dropped the blanket, reeling back a few steps. Flux stuck her head out, grinning.   
"Scare ya?" she asked.  
"Jesus Che-rist!" Tank panted. "Give me a heart attack!"   
Mouse's head appeared from behind Flux.   
"That's what she was trying to do."   
Tank gave him a nasty look. "Did you guys find anything down here?"  
Mouse looked at Flux. She looked back at him.  
"We found... ab-so-lutely nothing." She leaned back into Mouse, who put his arms around her waist. Tank raised an eyebrow.   
"How hard did you look?"  
Flux looked up at Mouse.   
"Well..." she started.  
"I guess..." Mouse interrupted her. "well... okay, not very."  
They both grinned sheepishly at Tank, who rolled his eyes and sighed.   
"Get back to looking, will you? We're running low."  
"You could help us, y'know." Flux cocked her head to the side. Tank considered it for a moment then sighed again.   
"Fine."   
Flux climbed to her feet. Mouse braced himself to stand up, then yelped in pain.   
"What is it?" Flux asked.   
"I don't know." Mouse lifted his hand. Stuck into the heel of his hand was a small black crystal. He tried to take it out. "Ouch.... Christ, that hurts. Can you get it out?"   
Flux held his hand still and took the crystal in between thumb and forefinger.   
"Hang on." she warned him, and quickly pulled it out.   
"Shit!" he hissed, putting his hand to his mouth. Flux wiped the crystal off on the hem of her shirt and then held it up. It was in surprisingly good condition for being kicked around in the hold for who knew how long. The end had been broken off, leaving the sharp edge that had lanced Mouse, but all of the rest of the corners were still intact.   
"That's worth holding on to." Tank had been looking over her shoulder at it. She nodded.  
"It would make an awesome choker." She grinned. Mouse looked at the hole in his palm. It was bleeding, making a small red pool in his hand.   
"God-damn it." He put his other thumb over it, trying to stop the blood. Flux tore off a side of the blanket and wound it around his wrist and up over his thumb in a crude sort of bandage. Tucking the end of the strip into itself, she gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and dropped the crystal into his hand.   
"There's the bugger."  
"Hey, that's a really nice crystal. If you could recut the end it would look pretty good." He held it up to the light and looked at it. "Neat."   
Tank had been going through the junk around them, and now yanked something out with a triumphant shout. He was holding a bundle of wires as thick as Flux's wrist of all different colors, lengths and thicknesses.   
"I knew they were down here." He gloated to Flux and Mouse.  
"Oh, shut up." Flux stuck her tongue out at him. Tank pretended to use her tongue for target practice, then turned and waded back to the tube upwards.   
"You guys might consider coming back up. I'm sure Morpheus'll find something else that needs to be done." He waved the wire bundle at them once, then crawled away. Mouse shrugged and followed him, leaving Flux to bring up the rear.   
  
  
Neo met them at the top of the ladder.   
"I though you guys had gotten lost. You find anything?"   
Tank handed him the wires, grinning. "These look good?"  
"Hell, yeah." Neo responded, grinning and took them from him. "What'd you do to your hand, Mouse?"   
"Stabbed myself with this." He held up the crystal. Neo made a face.   
"Ouch." He set the wires down, undoing the twist-tie around them. "Trinity, what do we need?" he called into the access panel in the wall of the ship.  
"One of the point eight blues, to begin with." she called back, and stuck a hand out to take it.   
  
The re-wiring didn't take long. Flux and Mouse helped hold things out of Trinity's way and sort wires. After a while, Mouse started trying to bring the crystal's end to a point again. Absentmindedly, Flux started knotting four of the soft fine wires together as if they were hemp strands. Mouse managed to get the crystal into a pretty good point and twisted a silver wire around it, making a kind of holder for it with a loop on the top. Flux finished the wire necklace-thing and put it down in front of her. Seeing it, Mouse took it and threaded one end of it through the loop on the crystal, then handed it to Flux.  
"You keep it.. it was your hand." She gave it back to him.  
"Yeah, but it'll look better on you, and besides, it was your idea."   
She laughed. "Okay, okay." Taking it, she put it around her neck and twisted the wires together in the back. "How's it look?"  
"Awesome."  
Flux shook her head, grinning, and hugged him.   
The lights flickered.  
The ship jerked.   
"Trinity?" Neo called down the service hatch. "We've got trouble." Her hand came back up, and Neo took it, helping her climb out.   
"What is it?" she asked. Tank was over at his monitors.   
"I don't know!" He was tapping furiously at the keyboard. "Nothing's showing up as being out there! There's nothing out there!" The ship jolted again, and this time there were scratching sounds directly overhead. Trinity hurried forwards to the cockpit.   
"There can't be nothing there." Neo protested.   
"It's not picking anything up! Are you sure you didn't disconnect the sensors?"   
"We didn't touch them!" Neo was indignant. The intercom crackled to life.   
"Tank, what's your reading?" Trinity's voice asked.  
"Still nothing. There's nothing out there."  
Another jolt, and the scratching sounds turned into the screech of strained metal.   
"Tank," It was Morpheus this time, "ready the EMP."  
Tank flipped the Plexiglas shield on the EMP switch up.   
"Ready, sir."   
"Fire EMP."   
Tank turned the switch. There was the familiar scream, and the ship shook. The scratching noises continued.   
"Oh gods." Flux whispered, looking up.  
"What the hell?" Tank looked at the readout above the switch and then back to the screens. "It didn't do anything." There was a scrambled conversation in the cockpit.  
"Tank, again." Morpheus commanded.  
"I can't.... it's still recharging!"  
There was a shower of sparks at the aft end of the ship.   
Where's that thing Cypher had.... the gun?" Trinity asked, over the intercom.  
Tank looked at Neo.  
"I think it's down here somewhere... why?" Tank told her.  
"Find it." Her voice was hard. "Fast." The chair in the cockpit squeaked as she got up.   
Neo scrambled to find the gun. It had been hidden under one of the numerous cable coils last time he had seen it, collecting dust. He pulled it out and dusted it off. Trinity came in.   
"Does it still work?" she asked.   
Neo flipped the switch and it hummed to life.   
"Good." She flipped it off and took it from him, heading towards a ladder on the wall.   
"What are you doing.." Tank asked at the same time Neo spoke.  
"You can't be.."   
Trinity was holding onto the gun with one hand and climbing up the ladder with the other. She knocked a trapdoor open and kept climbing, out of view.   
"Dammit." Neo hissed and scrambled after her. "Trinity... Trinity!"   
There was a clang and the muffled sound of wind. The main deck got three degrees colder. The sparks flying from the end of the ship stopped, and they could hear the crackle of electricity. There was a thud on the hull, then something fell over the side of the ship, bouncing on its way down, then shattered. Flux jumped. There was another clang and the wind noise stopped. Trinity came back down the ladder, with Neo right behind her. The gun was nowhere to be seen.  
"Trinity, that was stupid." Tank blurted out. She glanced at him as her feet hit the deck.   
"It got rid of it." was all she said. Neo jumped down behind her and crushed her in a huge hug.   
"You could have been killed."   
"I wasn't," she protested, but hugged him back. Morpheus came in from behind Tank.  
"Trinity, what was it?" he asked. Neo let go of her enough so she could turn and face Morpheus. She shook her head, then ran a hand through her hair as she spoke.   
"I'm not sure. It was a standard squiddy arrangement, but the whole thing looked like it was made out of ceramics. It shattered when it hit bottom, so I'm guessing that's what it was."   
"That would explain why the EMP didn't really work." Mouse piped in.   
"The ceramic wouldn't have shielded it enough that the pulse didn't get through..." Tank was thinking out loud.  
"It might have had some internal shield or something...." Neo added. Tank shook his head.   
"I doubt it."  
"What if they've come up with a way for the sentinels to adapt themselves?" Trinity offered. Tank and Neo looked at her.  
"That's not good news." Tank said.   
"Whatever these are, we must come up with a better defense." Morpheus closed the Plexiglas shield of the EMP switch.   
  
Agent Johnson grimaced. The ceramic Sentinel hadn't lasted half as long as it had been planned to. If they were going to take the Nebuchadnezzar and the two aboard, they were going to have to find an even better weapon. He ordered two of the new ceramic shielded Sentinels to keep a tail in the ship, but never to get any closer than seventy feet. He slowly allowed a smile to take over his face. Intelligent prey, but not intelligent enough. He would crack them if it took forever.  
  
%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*  
  
There were three more Sentinel attacks over the next three hours as they tried to get the power back into the hover-coils so they could move the ship. Two attacks were the old-fashioned un-shielded Sentinels that the EMP made short work of and the other was one of the scout models that clamped onto the hull and had to be de-magnetized before it would fall off. Flux quickly dubbed the scout models 'remoras' after their magnetic abilities. Nobody had told Morpheus about Flux's feeling that they were specifically after her and Neo, and it had been bugging Mouse all morning, even more so as he sat down in the mess hall next to Tank for lunch.  
"Did you tell Morpheus what Flux said?"  
"Hmmh?" Tank asked through a mouthful of goop.   
"You know... she said they were after her and Neo."  
"How does she know?" Tank argued. "She was probably just guessing."  
Mouse shook his head. "I don't know.... I think someone should tell him."  
"Why... now you have incredibly accurate hunches too?"  
"No.... but maybe she knows something we don't."  
"If she knows anything, she'd better own up to it before it gets us all killed."  
"Who's getting killed?" Flux had come up behind them and plunked her own bowl of glop down on the table.   
"We're going to if we have to go through much more of this." Tank growled under his breath. "Five attacks in four hours?"  
"Why do you think they're after you and Neo?" Mouse asked her.  
She shook her head. "I don't know... it's just a hunch. And more often than not, my hunches turn out to be right."   
"Did you tell Morpheus?" Tank asked.  
"No.... I didn't want to say anything..." She lifted her spoon and let the goop drip back into the bowl. Trinity sat down beside Tank.  
"Didn't want to say anything about what?" she asked. Flux looked down into her bowl. Mouse nudged her in the side.  
"The Sentinels.... I think they're after me and Neo. I don't know why I think that, or how I'd know, it's just a feeling I have." Flux blurted out.  
Trinity was silent for a moment. "Have you told Morpheus?"   
Flux shook her head.  
"I think I ought to tell him, but if it's only a feeling, I don't know what he'll do, or be able to do."  
Flux nodded. "Okay..." Trinity stood. "I don't know how I know, it's just a feeling. That's all I'll be able to tell him too." Flux shook her head. Trinity put a hand on the girl's shoulder and then left to speak to Morpheus.   
"Now what?" Mouse asked.   
"We sit tight." Tank replied.   
The lights went out.   
Without another word, the three got up and headed for the main deck.  
  
  
The intercom over the EMP switch was on and crackling.  
"Tank... you there?" Neo asked.  
"Yeah, I'm here." Tank responded, jumping into his chair and tapping out the sensor codes. "Got three fore and one aft and five hanging around outside blast radius. Good ol' fashioned Squiddies, as far as I can tell."  
"Thanks... Is Flux down there?"   
"Yeah."   
"Morpheus wants to make sure she's okay... he's sending me down there, too."  
"Why?"  
"Because of Flux's hunch. It's okay.. it still scares the shit out of me up here during an attack. I'll be right down."   
Trinity took over the intercom.   
"Tank, is the EMP charged?"   
"Yep. Charged and ready."  
Neo appeared from behind Tank's console.   
"Mouse?" Mouse swung around to face the intercom. "Can we get a hand up here? We're down a body."   
"Yeah, I'm coming." Mouse gave Flux a quick kiss on the cheek and ducked under a coil of wires to get to the cockpit. Neo came up behind her.  
"Doing okay?"   
"Scared shitless, same as you." She watched Tank pound something out on the keyboard.  
"Good way to be." Neo grinned at her and put a hand on her shoulder. Tank brought all the power down. There was a thud as the Sentinels moved in.   
"EMP, Tank. Now." Trinity was relaying the orders from Morpheus.   
"Gotcha." The ship bucked. There was a screech as something slid down the outside hull. "EMP successful. Recharging."  
"Yippee." Flux muttered under her breath.  
"Reading the next five in range."  
"Fire when ready."  
"It's like a bloody war." Neo exclaimed. "All of this fire when ready crap."  
"It is a war, in a way." Tank leaned back to look at them. "Us or them. You choose."  
"Uh... I'll take us for five hundred, Alex." Flux said sarcastically.   
"I second the motion." Neo leaned on the chair closest to Tank. "EMP's charged."  
Tank twisted the switch, making the ship shudder again. Another series of thuds on the ground outside.   
"You know it's gotten ridiculous when you're expecting an attack at any second." Tank flipped the Plexiglas shield down over the switch again. "Clear, Trinity."  
"Thanks, Tank."  
  
Time between attacks kept decreasing. When Flux finally gave up and fell into bed, they had been coming approximately an hour and a half, give or take a little, apart. She didn't know if she would be able to sleep through it, but she was so exhausted, she was willing to give it a try. Pulling her boots off, she yanked the blankets up and curled up against the wall.  
It felt like she had just fallen asleep when a magnetic clang resonated through the room. She rocketed back awake and lay there, listening. Unlike the last time, this time there was something else.... a low whine mixed with electronic murmur. Flux covered her ears, trying to block it out. It persisted inside her skull, making her teeth vibrate and her jaw ache. It was like someone was going layer by layer through everything in her head.... She screamed, then pulled the blanket closer. The Nebuchadnezzar twisted under her and she found herself on the floor, tangled in the bedclothes and still screaming. She thrashed around, trying to get free. The noise continued. Her eyes felt like they would explode. A thin stream of blood ran from her nose. The Neb bucked in the more familiar way from the EMP and the sound choked off as the remora fell to the ground. The door to her room was thrown open. Mouse was silhouetted in the doorway.   
"Flux?"  
She was sobbing, rocking on the ground, still tangled in the blankets, her hands clamped over her ears. Mouse knelt in front of her.   
"They were in my head!" she cried. "I could feel it... it was everywhere." Her lower lip trembled, and Mouse put his arms around her.  
  
Up above, on watch duty for the second shift in the night, Trinity was helping a dazed Neo stand again.  
"What happened?" she asked him.  
"I don't know." he shook his head gingerly. "It was in my head, and everything was vibrating. I thought my eyes were going to pop."  
Trinity helped him sit down in the nearest chair.   
"Are you going to be okay?"   
"I think so." He rubbed his temples. "Hurt like hell. Was it a sentinel or one of those remoras?"  
"A remora...." Trinity suddenly remembered the conversation with Flux over lunch. "I wonder if the same thing happened to Flux?"  
"I hope not."   
  
Flux was partially hysterical. She was cold and tired and scared out of her wits. All she could bring herself to do was sob quietly into Mouse's shoulder. He let her, stroking her back lightly to try to calm her down. She hiccuped once and then stopped, wiping at her nose with the back of her sleeve.   
"Doing better?" Mouse asked.  
Flux nodded. "A little."  
"You want to get back in bed?"   
"I guess so." She let him help her off the floor to sit on the edge of the bunk, where he sat next to her. Her hands shook a little as she rubbed her temples, trying to massage the noise out of her skull. "That stupid song's still stuck in my head." she attempted to make a joke out of the situation, then yawned. "I'm never going to be able to get back to sleep." With a sigh, she lay down again, curling up back against the wall and pulling the blankets around her. She had kind of a glazed look on her face... she was tired but too scared to sleep. Mouse stood up to leave.   
"No... Mouse. Stay here.... please?" She reached up and took his hand. He smiled and sat down again, squeezing her hand. She grinned back and closed her eyes.   
  
Even after she fell asleep, Mouse couldn't bring himself to leave, just in case she woke up or if there was another attack. He tucked his feet up under the blanket poncho he had on and lay back, using his arm as a pillow.   
Sometime in the middle of the night Flux shifted enough to put her head on Mouse's shoulder, curling up beside him. Half-awake, he put an arm around her.   
  
The attacks were raggedly spaced through the rest of the night, some coming less than twenty minutes apart, others coming more than two hours apart. Around the time the fourth night watch started, there was a strange noise from outside that woke Mouse up. It was a low hum he knew he should recognize. He listened for a moment, then realized what it was. The hover coils on the ship were going through their charging sequence. the hum deepened, and the ship shuddered once as it lifted off the ground. Flux woke up with a start, lifting her head and looking around. The bandanna she had had tied on over her almost-bald head had fallen off.   
"What's going on?" she whispered.  
"They got the coils working again. We're moving."   
Flux sighed in relief and put her head back down on his shoulder. "Good. At least now we're a moving target."   
"But still a target."  
"I hope not. Gods, I hope not." She sighed. "Talk about jumping out of the pot and into the fire."   
Mouse kissed her forehead. "Now that we've got the coils back it'll be easier to hide from them... you'll see."   
"You'd better be right." Flux draped one arm over his chest and closed her eyes again. He squeezed her shoulders, and she grinned, her eyes still shut. "You had better be right."   
  
Tank and Mouse had gotten assigned the last night watch, and Tank had gone on early, relieving Trinity and Neo so Trinity could get Neo down to sickbay and make sure he was okay after the remora attack. It was now at least a quarter of the way through the watch and Mouse hadn't shown up yet. Curious, Tank went looking for him, peeking in through his half open door. He wasn't there. Tank pushed the door farther open.   
"Mouse?" he called. No reply. He wasn't in the bed, and the blankets looked like they'd been thrown off quickly, like he was in a hurry. Tank stuck his head back out the door. Trinity was coming down the hall towards him.  
"Mouse is AWOL. Seen him?" he asked. Trinity shook her head.  
"Isn't he supposed to be on watch now?"   
"Yeah, with me, and he's not. I don't know where he is."   
"Does he sleepwalk?"   
"Not that I know of."   
Trinity scratched the back of her head. "I'll check down in the storage hold. You check to other rooms and the mess hall. If we don't find him there, we'll get Morpheus in on it."   
Tank nodded and headed towards the mess hall.   
"Hey Mouse," he called. It echoed dully back to him. No answer. He started going down the rooms, pulling the doors open and calling in. The door to Flux's room was slightly ajar and he pulled it the rest of the way open.   
Tank grinned. "Shoulda known." he muttered to himself, shaking his head. Trinity appeared from the end of the hall.   
"Nothing down there."   
"Shhh... he's in here. Come look." He motioned her forward. She peered around the door, then smiled.   
"And you're going to take him away from that to put him on watch duty? You're cruel."   
Tank shrugged. "Watch duty is watch duty." He started into the room to wake Mouse up. Trinity grabbed his arm.  
"Wait... let me do it. You'll wake them both up, and she needs to sleep. She's not used to the funny hours we have yet." Trinity bent over Mouse and put her mouth next to his ear. "Hey Mouse.... wake up. You've got duty. Come on Mouse. I know you're in there. Wake up."   
Mouse groaned and turned his head away.   
"Mouse... You have to get up now."  
He opened one eye and glared at Trinity. "What d'ya want?"   
"You're late for your watch duty."  
"Oh.... dammit!" He started to sit up, moving Flux. She muttered something in her sleep and her forehead wrinkled. Mouse shifted her to the side so he could get up. She held onto his arm. Beads of sweat formed on her forehead, and she shook her head like she was trying to shake something off.   
"Hey...." Tank was watching from behind Trinity.  
"Flux. What's happening?" Trinity asked. The girl started to shiver all over.  
"No!" she whispered. "no... no!" She pressed her fist to the bridge of her nose.   
"Trinity.... I think....." Tank started.  
A scream from down the hall cut him off.   
"Oh God... Neo." Trinity scrambled to her feet and flew out the door. A few seconds later, Flux screamed in response, and started to shake violently, then suddenly curled into a fetal position and started crying. Her eyes opened, blurry, then focused on Mouse.   
"Mouse... Neo." she whispered. "Where's Neo?" She swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood up, almost falling back again because her knees were shaking. Mouse put one arm around her waist and helped her stumble down the hall. Tank was hovering in between the two rooms and helped Mouse get Flux into Neo's room without having her collapse.   
  
Trinity was trying to keep a partially hysterical Neo calm as Flux stumbled in. Neo's eyes locked on the girl.  
"It was...." he started  
"Did you..." she interrupted, breaking away from Mouse and Tank.  
"... the white lady...."  
".... see them torturing...."  
"...she had everybody....." Neo had gotten up and was holding on to Flux's elbows. She, in turn was clutching white knuckled to his forearms.  
"It was awful...." she whispered.  
"All that blood...."  
"And you were..." Flux gave a cry. Neo grabbed her and held her, burying his face in her neck. She had both arms around his neck and was sobbing into his shoulder.   
Trinity, Tank and Mouse looked at one another. Morpheus rushed in.   
"I thought I heard...." He trailed off, looking at the two newest members of the Neb's crew in the middle of the floor. "What's going on?" He directed the question at Trinity. She shook her head.  
"I don't know."   
Breathing hard, Flux raised her head and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. Neo wiped tears away with his thumb. Trinity came forward and put a hand on his arm.   
"What was it?"  
He shook his head. "It was.... I was in a room... it was carpeted, and I was sitting on the floor..... I had handcuffs on..... Then I was in a chair... like on of ours, on the main deck.... in a white room.... and someone was putting the connector in..... it burned going in.... like someone had heated it.... it was on fire.... All of the walls got clear..... or they were gone... they weren't there anymore and I could see all around me..... There were three other rooms I cold see into... and there were people in them. I was turning... They were torturing the other people.... they were .... burning them..... one of them had scars across their back.... they had electrodes on their temples..... then I could see into the fourth room.... and there was someone in a chair like the one I was in.... I couldn't see the face until the white lady put the electrodes on her... and then she jerked up... and it was Flux and then they were torturing me too, even though I couldn' see them. There was nobody in the room with me.... They were asking me questions, but I couldn't understand what they wanted. I knew if I could answer them they'd stop, but I didn't know what they wanted... I tried to scream but they'd cut my tongue out...." He was shaking all over. Trinity took his hands and made him sit on the bed.   
Flux was shivering, her legs weak, and started to turn, almost falling. Mouse darted forward and caught her as she sagged towards the ground, putting one of her arms around his shoulders and helping her stand again.   
"Flux. The same thing happened to you?" Morpheus asked. She nodded.   
"They..." it came out as a whisper. She swallowed. "They did the same thing to me.... there was nobody in the room with me.... and then I saw Neo.... and they were torturing him... and then me.... and I could feel in my mouth.... my tongue was gone, and there was blood everywhere..."   
Everybody was silent.  
"How can this only affect the two of you?" Morpheus broke the silence. "Why isn't everyone aboard having the same nightmare?"  
"It was no nightmare." Neo protested. "It was real. It was as real as anything here."  
Flux nodded.  
"Wait.." Tank had an idea. "Doesn't everybody's skull resonate at a different frequency? Maybe that's what they're using."   
"That would explain the attack where you complained about your skull vibrating. They were finding your frequency." Trinity was thinking out loud.   
"And then they used that frequency to broadcast the images to only the two of you." Mouse finished. "That makes sense... but why are they doing it in the first place?"   
Morpheus shook his head. "I don't know." He put a hand on Mouse's shoulder. "It's time we got to work on the hovercoils. They're only at thirty percent. If we have another attack, I want to be able to run before they start broadcasting." One by one, they solemnly left the room.   
  
  
As the first one up, Tank jumped into his chair and pulled up the schematic of the Neb. The others gathered behind him and Morpheus, Trinity and Mouse still helping Neo and Flux stay on their feet.   
"Mouse, we're going to have to repair the tubing on the eighth coil again. I think if you show Flux what needs to be done, she can do it. The smaller you are the easier it is to get down in there. You can belay. Flux... are you up to it?"   
Flux nodded.  
"Mouse, find what you're going to need. Tank, you're going to spot Mouse, just to make sure nothing happens. Trinity, I need you to sty down in the mess hall with the breaker and make sure there are no power surges through the coils while we work on them. If there are, you know the drill. Shut everything off. Everything. Neo, you're going to be at the helm with me."  
Trinity and Neo nodded.  
"Let's get to work." Morpheus and Neo headed towards the front of the ship, and Trinity headed the opposite way, down the ladder to the mess hall.   
"I'll be right back." Mouse took his arm from around Flux's waist to go find the stuff they'd need for the repair.   
"You could have left that there." She grabbed his hand and raised her eyebrows.   
"Ooh! Down, girl!" Tank commented from behind her.   
"Somebody's feeling better." Mouse said, blushing slightly and giving her a kiss on the corner of the mouth. "I'll be right back." He went around to the utility ladder and climbed down.  
Flux sat on the side of the chair and rolled her head from side to side, stretching her neck out.   
"For someone who just lived through a near-death experience, you sure are feisty." Tank needled her.   
"Shut up, Tank."   
"Hey... what an attitude!"  
"Shut UP, Tank." She stood up behind him and put him in a headlock.   
"Okay... okay! You're perfectly normal!" he cried. Flux let him go and sat back down again.  
"I don't know if I'd go that far." She grinned. Mouse came back up the ladder carrying two packs of stuff. He dropped one on the ground next to Tank and brought the other one over to the chair Flux was sitting on.   
"Here. I have to show you what you're doing before you get out there. The hover coils are basically like really big neon tubes. They're glass with a special formula in them. Sometimes, they get holes. When that happens, we have to go out and fix them." He handed her what looked like a propane torch with an extremely long neck. "That's what you're going to use. You have to get down next to the tube with the flame and heat it up until the hole melts itself shut. It usually only takes about five minutes. The catch is that you have to do this hanging on a cable from the top of the ship." He dropped what looked like a mountain climbing harness on the chair next to her. "Coil eight's the one directly in the middle of the coil on the left side of the ship. Don't worry.. it's not as hard as it sounds. You up to it? If you're not, I can do it, but I think Morpheus wants you to get the experience."   
Flux exhaled. "I can do it."  
Mouse grinned. "Great. I don't really fit back in between the coils anymore. Lemme help you get the harness on." The harness was actually a mountain climbing harness with shoulder and chest straps added. Tank reached down into the pack next to his chair and pulled a coil of braided steel cable out, handing it to Mouse. Flux tucked the propane torch into a loop on the harness and let Mouse lead her up the ladder to the access hatch on the top of the ship. Three fourths of the way up the ladder, the internal hull ended, blocking off the view down to the main deck except for the ladder space. There was a landing there, and they paused for a moment. The gun Trinity had taken up to fight off the ceramic sentinels was sitting there, a cobbled together weapon that didn't look intimidating in the least. Mouse started climbing again, and Flux followed him. He stopped at the top and looked down at her.   
"Ready?"  
She nodded. He twisted the magnetic seal control beside the hatch and pushed it open. Immediately the cold air started to fall into the ship. "Come on!" Mouse had to yell above the wind. He climbed out onto the hull of the ship. Taking the cable out, he unwound it and attached one end of it to the back of Flux's harness. The other end he wound around a pulley system bolted to the hull, through a series of metal loops and clipped to a bar welded onto the hull.  
"Okay. You should be able to kind of climb down the back here, and get to coil eight. It'll be really obvious because it'll be the only one that's not on. Fix the hole, then yank twice on the cable and I'll help you get back up. Got it?"  
Flux nodded. "Got it. Is it always this cold out here?"   
"Usually."   
"I'll be a popsicle by the time I'm done!" Flux started backing over the top of the ship.  
"Tell you what... you go down and fix the hole and I'll stay here and think of creative ways to warm you up again." Mouse called.  
She paused, only her head still visible over the curve of the ship and cocked her head to the side, raising an eyebrow. "Is that a promise?" she called back, and then chuckled as she slid over the side.   
"Oh yeah." Mouse whispered to himself. "That's definitely a promise."  
  
Mouse had been right. It was easy to spot the coil with the hole in it. Flux slid the rest of the way down and wedged herself in between what she presumed was coil seven and one side of coil eight. She found the quarter sized hole quickly and pulled out the torch, turning it on and melting the glass back together. The flame and the hot glass helped keep her at least semi-warm as she finished. Flipping the torch off, she blew over the top of it like it was a smoking gun and then jammed it back into the loop on the belt. Wiggling a little so she was loose from in between the two coils, she yanked on the cable twice.  
  
"Mouse!"   
Flux had been down for about four minutes. Mouse stuck his head back inside the hatch. Tank was standing on the landing.   
"We've got trouble!" he called up.  
"Like what?"  
"Eight squiddies on their way and the EMP's being weird. We're gonna have to run. Get Flux back in!"   
As he finished his sentence, the pulleys jangled twice.   
"Okay!" Mouse pulled his head back out of the hatch and grabbed the cable, pulling it back and looping it around the hook that was there. Flux was doing her best to help, pulling herself up whenever she could get a hand hold.   
"Whew!" she breathed as she reached the top. "That was almost fun!" Mouse grinned, and moved behind her to unhook the cable. He was winding it back up when the ship lurched, the coils humming back to life.   
Flux screamed. She was sliding, and scrabbling to get a hold on something. Mouse threw himself forward and grabbed her wrist in one hand, holding on to the side of the open hatch with the other.   
"Hold on!" he yelled to her.  
"I'm slipping!" she yelled back. Her left hand was frantically searching for something to hold on to. She knew if she put any more weight on him, he'd lose his grip and they'd both go over. He was pulling now, bracing himself inside the hatch and trying to pull her back up.   
The ship jerked again, this time starting to move forward. Her grip slipped down even further, crushing his fingers. He scrambled to pull her up, hooking his legs over the side of the open hatch cover and grabbing her wrist with his other hand. The Neb hit another bump and she slid further, holding on with barely her fingers.   
"Mouse!" she yelled.  
He felt her slipping.  
"NO!" he screamed.   
She fell.   
Everything seemed to slow down. He was reaching for her, stretching as much as he could. She was sliding down the smooth side of the ship, trying to get a purchase on anything.   
"FLUX!" He realized it was his voice screaming her name.   
"Mouse!" The cry was fainter. She was farther away... falling. The ship was going faster. He barely had time to see her hit the ground and roll before she was behind them. Turning, he half fell down the ladder. Tank was waiting and had to catch him as he hit the bottom.   
"Go back.. stop... go back.. go back!" Mouse was blubbering.   
"Mouse... Mouse! Calm down, man! I can't understand a thing you're saying!" Tank helped him to his feet  
"Flux.... fell over.... the side!" He pulled away from Tank and ran forward into the cockpit. "Morpheus.... we have to go back...... Flux fell.... and she's back there somewhere......" He was breathing hard. Morpheus turned to face him.  
"She's not back inside?"  
Mouse shook his head, almost in tears. "No!"   
"Neo, have we lost the sentinels yet?" Morpheus asked.  
"Nope. Three of 'em still on our tail."  
"Only three?" Mouse cried. That left five back there to pick Flux apart. Horrible images of blood and bones picked through by the sentinels danced through his head in a grisly parade.  
"We can't go back, Mouse. I'm sorry."   
Then Mouse was turning, stumbling, tears streaming down his face, falling down the ladder, down the hall to her room where he threw himself on the bed and bawled.   
  
%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%  
  
It was black. It was so very black. And so very cold. Flux opened her eyes. Something was pressing into her cheek, pinching the skin against her teeth painfully. Sitting up, she shook her head.   
It all came rushing back.   
"Mouse?" she asked tentatively. "Mouse! MOUSE!" There was no answer but a low humming noise. The Neb was nowhere to be seen  
She looked up.   
There were five metallic.... THINGS... hovering above her. *They must be Sentinels* her last coherent thought flickered through her mind. They were big and gray and shiny and had a million eyes and a million ARMS and all the arms had nasty looking ends on themand they were getting closer to her and they were reaching towards her and they were grabbing at her....  
She passed out.   
  
The biggest Sentinel extended a cage-like clawed hand and plucked the unconscious girl off of the stony ground.   
  
Agent Johnson smiled, touching his earpiece. They had one. Not the way they had planned to capture either of the targets, but one of them had quite literally fallen into their hands. His mind was already running with new ways to get the girl to speak.  
  
Sentinels were not designed for transport. Flux dangled out of the leader's claw like a bad King-Kong reenactment. She had to squint as she regained consciousness, against the wind that was blowing and the speed. She figured they were going at least a good forty miles per hour, if not over that. The Sentinels had going around corners down to an art, whipping around with arms flailing to within a foot of any debris but never quite close enough to hit. She yelped more than once as she thought her head was going to be dashed against an obstacle. She did her best to watch for anything that would stick out as a landmark, years of watching bad cop shows stuck in her head. If she could get to something and broadcast to the Neb, or just broadcast wideband where the hell she was or what she was near there was a hope of rescue. Or at very least some kind of help. There was the ruin of a pointed building that reminded her of Portland's Koin tower.... a blast that had left debris in an almost perfect flat circle.... She was whipped around another fast corner and lost her bearings again, closing her eyes against the stinging wind. They were slowing down now.. the wind wasn't coming quite as fast..... A low silver dome winked on the horizon. Millennium? Flux wondered. It looked the same but smoother somehow. They were moving towards it. Flux did a double take. The silver paint seemed to be moving... alive! They dropped closer to it. IT wasn't silver paint at all, but thousands of tiny, almost microscopic multi-legged robots. They were seething over the top of the dome even as it opened under the Sentinels. There was a grinding noise as it stopped, crushing a few of the spider-'bots to death, Flux assumed. The Sentinel carrying her was starting to crush her ribcage, making it heard to breathe. She pushed at the claw. The Sentinel ignored her, and dropped through the opening in the dome, the other following. The dome slid shut again. Flux squinted. It was surprisingly bright the bottom of the dome ringed with fluorescent tubing-light.   
There was a hole, like the opening at the front of a hangar but in the floor that the four extra Sentinels dropped into, leaving the one carrying Flux out. A group of people, at least they looked like people, came running forward. the Sentinel extended the claw carrying Flux and dropped her in front of them, then turned and dropped into the hangar-space after its' associates. Flux had hardly hit the ground when there was a needle jabbed into the back of her neck and something injected. She yelped and jerked away sluggishly. Her vision swam. The people were leaning over her, looking at her. They looked human but not human at the same time..... something was wrong. Something was very wrong. She tried to turn to run and fell, her legs like jello. the last thing she remembered was her face pressed into the fine loose dirt and her arms being twisted behind her.   
  
  
Trinity was going up the ladder from her post at the breaker as she heard what sounded like a muffled sob from down the hall. She stopped and waited for a moment, trying to decide if it was just the wind outside or if it merited looking in to. There it was again. She backed down the ladder and peered down the hall. The only door that was open was Neo's, and there was nobody there.   
"Hello?" she asked. Another muffled noise... it was coming from the next room over. Flux's room. Trinity nudged the door open and looked in. There was someone on the bed....   
"Flux?"   
The figure on the bed shook its head. Trinity opened the door further. The light from the hall illuminated the dark room enough for her to pick out the shape of Mouse's ratty hat.   
"Mouse?" She was confused. Still face down, he nodded and tried to stifle another sob. Trinity sat down on the bed next to him and put a hand on his back. "What's wrong?"  
He shook his head again.   
"Come on Mouse.... what's wrong?"   
Mouse looked up at her. His eyes were red and wet and there were tear-marks down his face. He scrubbed at his eyes with the hem of his sleeve.   
"Flux fell and it's all my fault." he croaked.   
"What?" Trinity was taken aback.   
"Flux fell.... over the side..... when the Sentinels.... attacked." he choked out and buried his face in the pillow again.   
"And she's hurt? Is she in the sickbay?" Trinity stood up.  
"No!" Mouse wailed. "She's back there somewhere!"   
"WHAT? Did you tell Morpheus?"   
"Yes! I told Tank and then I ran up there to the cockpit and told Morpheus and he said that there were too many Sentinels and we couldn't go back."   
"Oh my god... Mouse."   
He let her hug him, impassively staring at the opposite wall and biting his lip, trying not to burst into a fresh flood of tears. She pulled back and looked at him for a minute. A single tear leaked out of the corner of his eye and she used the corner of his blanket-poncho to wipe it away. His lower lip trembled and he closed his eyes, bowing his head. Trinity put her arms around him and he put his head on her shoulder and cried.   
  
The upper left screen blinked off, then came up blank except for a spiky icon in the center of the screen.   
"What the hell?" Neo peered at it, then opened the program it belonged to.   
  
THIS IS FOR ALL SHIPS.   
  
A pause.   
"What the HELL?" Neo turned and shouted towards the mess hall. "TANK! Get up here!"   
Seconds later, Tank came scrambling up the ladder.   
"What?"   
"Look." Neo gestured towards the cryptic green message.  
  
ESPECIALLY THE NEBUCHADNEZZAR.  
  
"Get up." Tank took over his chair and typed something in. Three of the other screens stopped running the Matrix code and started scanning the frequency.   
  
ARE YOU LISTENING, ZION?  
  
"Go get Morpheus and Trinity." Tank ordered.  
"I'm going."   
Morpheus was there in record time, and Trinity appeared a half-minute later, one arm around Mouse's shoulders. His eyes were puffy and red and he looked miserable.   
"Where is it from?" Morpheus asked.   
Tank shook his head. "I don't know. Nobody seems to know. All the ships are getting it and nobody has a clue about the origin."   
"Are you recording it?" Trinity suggested.   
"Yeah, it's all going down."  
  
PREPARE FOR TRANSMISSION.......  
  
The dots slowly filled the screen, then disappeared.   
  
BEGIN TRANSMISSION   
  
flashed briefly on the screen and then there was a man standing there, in front of a non-descript dirty grayish wall. A fluorescent tube hung to the side of his head and cast peculiar shadows across his face. He grinned, showing a mouthful of silver tooth implants.   
"I just want you to know, Morpheus, that we received the little... gift... from your ship. I hope you're hearing this." He drug out his f's and s's, giving him a snake-like accent. He stepped in closer to the camera. "We..." he paused to look for the right word. "...appreciate it." He stepped back again and the camera panned down to show a backlit human-shaped lump at his feet.   
  
"No...." Mouse breathed.   
  
"Can we get some light on her?" The man was directing people out of sight of the camera. Another fluorescent light strip was lit and handed to the man.   
"I assume you'll recognize her." He shoved the person over on their back and yanked her head up, holding the light next to her face.  
Her eyes were only half open and she looked drugged and drunk and out of it, but it was unmistakably Flux, her forearms bound together in front of her.   
"You can see she's a little out of it right now.... just side effects of the sedative, but I'm sure she'll be willing to talk to you later. It's too bad she may not be able to." He dropped her head and gave her a sharp kick in the side.   
  
"Bastard!" Mouse hissed. Trinity held onto his shoulder tighter.   
  
"You see," the man continued. "she's going to get to meet Snow Queen. Neo.... I believe you've seen her." Another sharp silver grin. "And Snow Queen is going to expect her to talk. And if... what do you call her.... Flux?.... doesn't talk, Snow Queen is going to make sure she never does again. Snow queen will make sure she never wants to live again."  
  
"Snow Queen..." Neo muttered. "Snow Queen..... oh jesus christ. Jesus freaking christ..... the white lady.... they'll cut her tongue out. They'll torture her.... " Agitated, he ran a hand through his hair. "We can't let them do that... Morpheus. We can't let them do that to her."  
Tank put a hand on his arm. "We won't."   
  
"Neo. I assume you've figured it out? Good boy. For the One, you sure do take your time sometimes." Silvertooth examined one of his fingers, then bent it at the top joint. From the fingernail came a sharp thin blade. "Don't worry. We won't hurt her too badly at first." He drug the blade down the outside of her arm, cutting through the two layers of fabric to draw a thin line of blood. There was no response from Flux but a slow drugged blink. "It's only when she won't tell us what we want to know we have to resort to pain. Have a nice day... oh, and if you want to leave one of your screens free you'll be able to see her every once in a while... of course, after a while I'm not sure you'll want to. Anyway, enjoy."   
  
END TRANSMISSION  
  
The screen went black and then started scanning the Matrix code once more. Mouse let out a choked-off sob and covered his face with his hands. They were all frozen there, running the transmission over in their heads.   
Tank was the first one to speak.  
"My god." he whispered. "What can we do?" He looked from Neo to Trinity to Morpheus.   
Morpheus shook his head.  
"I don't know. We have to find her. Somehow."   
  
  
  
  



End file.
